A mathematical programming model for sustainable agricultural supply chain network design under uncertainty

Evaluating the sustainability in the crop supply chain plays an important role in creating an efficient supply chain and increasing food safety in developing countries. Therefore, in the present study, an efficient network of greenhouses, agricultural lands, processing plants, and agricultural distribution centers (farmer’s markets) have been designed with regards to the sustainability dimension and with the purpose of minimizing the costs, minimizing the greenhouse gas emissions, and maximizing employment. The uncertainty has been identified as an inevitable part of studies in some parameters such as Brix, deterioration rate, employment rate, ideal yield, and water consumption rate. Also, the use of agricultural methods and techniques such as crop rotation policy, the use of nurtured seedling, and the consideration of Brix are among the issues that have been considered to increase the efficiency of the products and consequently to increase the economic efficiency. The model proposed with augmented ε-constraint method has been solved, and its efficiency has been investigated by presenting a case study in Iran. The results of the model solution indicate that the use of different planting policies, the consideration of Brix index, and effective attention to crop rotation policy has led to higher productivity of agricultural lands, production of higher quality products by expending lower prices and preserving environmental resources such as soil and water; so that the water consumption is reduced by 65.258%. Furthermore, the proposed model increases employment in the region and reduces unemployment by 11.2%