SUSTAINABILITY AND THE COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE: THE PERSPECTIVE OF THE LOGISTICS INDUSTRY

• Main Author: Bima Setiawan, Syafrie
• Format: Final Project
• Language: Indonesia
• Online Access: https://digilib.itb.ac.id/gdl/view/46376
• Institution: Institut Teknologi Bandung

Globalization impacted the way people live in this era. From the side of supply chain there are barely barriers between countries because of many factors, such as free trade agreement (FTA) between countries, the increase in the global population, and the advancement of technology. These factors boost the demand for supply chain in the global market as well as the freight transport in the logistics industry. In turn, the more frequent the freight transport is, the more impact it has on the environment because of emission and pollution they generated. To make the environment and supply chain activities more balance, sustainable actions should be implemented in the logistics industry to reduce the negative impacts it has on the environment. Some research has shown that sustainable actions improve consumer’s trust and company reputation that will help companies to sustain their competitive advantage. Unfortunately, sustainability research in sustaining company’s competitive advantage has received limited attention. The authors hope that this paper could fill the gap on that matter. Thus, the research question of this paper would be how does sustainable freight transport matter in the logistics industry to sustain competitive advantage? This paper will discuss it from the perspective of two theories which are Research-Based View and Dynamic Capabilities. The result showed that companies who adopt sustainable practices within its operations could sustain their competitive advantage due to the improvement of its customer’s satisfaction and the company’s ESG ratings. Also, the use of DC theory complements the RBV theory in a sense that resources should be maintained and developed rather than taken as granted. It is relevant to discuss this issue since the demand for logistics is increasing over time and the activities will impact the environment to a greater extent.