Challenges of Fruit and Vegetable Retailing in The Regional Supply Chain and The Impact on Logistics: The Case of Hatay Province

Abstract

Food retailing, which has different dynamics and practices on a global and regional scale, is a subject that has not been sufficiently examined at the regional level, especially in terms of the problems and practices encountered in fresh fruit and vegetable departments. In this context, examining the problems experienced by regional chain markets within the scope of food supply chain and warehousing activities and determining the interaction between priority problems is of great importance in developing solutions. Analytic Network Process (ANP) method stands out with its widespread use among the approaches that allow to examine this interaction. The application in this study was carried out with chain supermarkets operating in Hatay province and having at least five branches. The study consists of two stages and is based on quantitative and qualitative analysis methods. In the first stage, face-to-face interviews were conducted with chain market managers in order to identify the problems and the problems experienced in the fruit and vegetable departments at the regional level were identified. Then, the identified problems were evaluated with a questionnaire containing pairwise comparison questions and analyzed with the ANP method to determine the priorities of the problems. As a result of the analysis, it was determined that cost-related problems were the most important problem.