Bicriterion distribution planning for agricultural power fuels

Distribution of commodities such as power fuels to agricultural operations often involves trade-offs among competing criteria (for instance, minimization of delivery time versus maximization of volume delivered). The agricultural environment faces a number of market dynamics, including declining margins and more efficient farming methods such as ‘no-till’ farming, that affect the demand for power fuels. This dynamic environment requires farm managers to examine the supply chain for opportunities to obtain more effective delivery plans. We present an approach for distribution planning. It is comprised of three tightly-coupled stages with an underlying DSS system which we also applied to this single-commodity multiple-depot scenario of distributing agricultural power fuel to customers. The process facilitates (1) Problem characterization, (2) Model specification, and (3) Interactive distribution planning. A synthesis of the literature with our current study offers managers and academics a useful application scenario for integrating process components and viewing the major thrusts of past research. We present an illustrative case study which required a bicriteria model. Trade-offs are examined among non-dominated distribution plans.