Sustainable Supplier Selection in Pulp and Paper Industry on the Basis of Reduction of Carbon Emission: MCDM Model

Suppliers that demonstrate sustainable practices and policies, such as reducing their carbon footprint, using environmentally friendly materials and practices, promoting social equity and diversity, and ensuring economic viability are regarded as sustainable suppliers. The pulp and paper industry has been responsible for direct industrial carbon emissions. This industry being the largest user of original or virgin wood imposes a direct effect on local flora and fauna as well as the aquatic economy. Thus, there is a need for making this industry more environmentally sustainable. Moreover, India aims to achieve a net-zero carbon emissions target by 2070. Thus, in this study, the focus lies on selecting sustainable suppliers for the pulp and paper industry in turn controlling carbon emissions. This study has several criteria to be considered, one of the most important being the carbon emissions. Each criterion is categorised as Beneficial and Non-beneficial. The beneficial criteria are Service Quality and Quality. While, the non-beneficial are Lead time, Price and Carbon Emissions. Multi-Criteria decision making (MCDM) plays an important role in the sustainable supplier selection process. Here, TOPSIS, VIKOR and COPRAS are the MCDM methods which are used further in this paper. The findings from the three methods shows that the supplier with the highest ranks has low Carbon Emissions and smallest ranks are for suppliers with higher emissions. The higher emission group of suppliers need to measure, manage and reduce carbon foot prints.