Sanjoy Kumar Paul, Priyabrata Chowdhury, Md. Tarek Chowdhury, Ripon Kumar Chakrabortty and Md. Abdul Moktadir
The recent coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic poses numerous challenges to supply chains. This pandemic is quite unique when compared to previous epidemic disruptions…
Abstract
Purpose
The recent coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic poses numerous challenges to supply chains. This pandemic is quite unique when compared to previous epidemic disruptions and has had a severe impact on supply chains. As a result, the operational challenges (OCs) caused by COVID-19 are still unknown among practitioners and academics. It is critical to comprehensively document current OCs so that firms can plan and implement strategies to overcome them. Consequently, this study systematically identifies and ranks COVID-19-related OCs.
Design/methodology/approach
This study uses an integrated methodology combining expert interviews and the best-worst method (BWM) to analyze the results. The data have been collected from the electronics industry of Bangladesh, an emerging economy. This study also conducts a sensitivity analysis to check the robustness of the results.
Findings
The results reveal 23 COVID-19-related OCs under five categories: sourcing, production and inventory management, demand management and distribution, return management and after-sales service, and supply chain-wide challenges. The quantitative investigation reveals that overstock in finished goods inventory, low end-customer demands, order cancellations from dealers and retailers, high inventory holding costs and lack of transportation are the top five OCs.
Practical implications
The findings will help practitioners to understand the OCs and allow them to prepare for future major disruptions and formulate long-term strategies for operations during and after the COVID-19 pandemic.
Originality/value
This study contributes to the literature on supply chain complexity and challenges by considering a major pandemic outbreak. Moreover, the study also contributes to the knowledge on emerging economies, which have been largely neglected in the current literature.
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Md. Tarek Chowdhury, Aditi Sarkar, Pronab Kumer Saha and Rakib Hasan Anik
The COVID-19 pandemic interrupts the supply chain of products around the world. The supply chains of beauty and personal care products in Bangladesh are also heavily interrupted…
Abstract
Purpose
The COVID-19 pandemic interrupts the supply chain of products around the world. The supply chains of beauty and personal care products in Bangladesh are also heavily interrupted during this pandemic. While these products are perceived as essential by mass people, retailers are struggling to get the supply of the products and maintain a smooth delivery to the people. Considering such facts, the purposes of the study are to identify how the supply of retailers of these products is interrupted and how they can overcome the interruptions to ensure supply resilience.
Design/methodology/approach
A case study method has been used in this study. The data has been collected through interviews from 16 retailers of beauty and personal care products.
Findings
The results show that the supply of retailers of beauty and personal care products is interrupted in several ways. These include product shortage, limited delivery service, interruption of supplier payment, limited credit facility and irregularity in product delivery. To minimize the impacts of the interruptions and enhance supply resilience, retailers can undertake several strategies including intensive interactions and developing cooperation with the distributors and manufacturers, ordering bulk quantity, formulating an adjusted credit ratio and focusing on product availability over brand preference.
Research limitations/implications
The context of this study is limited to the beauty and personal care products of Bangladesh. Further study can be conducted in other countries and also supply chains of other products to enhance the generalizability of the findings of this study.
Practical implications
Supply interruptions are identified, and strategies are suggested to ensure the supply resilience of retailers of beauty and personal care products. If proposed strategies are implemented by retailers of these products, supply interruptions can be minimized.
Originality/value
The study contributes to the knowledge of the retail supply chain during a pandemic. It also contributes to the supply management and resilience of retailers. As the context is a developing country, the study also contributes to the literature on developing countries.
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Leena Afroz Mostofa Chowdhury, Tarek Rana and Mohammad Istiaq Azim
The purpose of this paper is to, the first of its kind, investigate the relationship between the intellectual capital efficiency and organisational performance of the…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to, the first of its kind, investigate the relationship between the intellectual capital efficiency and organisational performance of the pharmaceutical sector in Bangladesh, an emerging economy that enjoys Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) relaxation.
Design/methodology/approach
The study used hand-picked data from annual reports for five years. The relationship between efficient use of intellectual capital and corporate performance was examined through the practical use of human capital, structural capital and capital employed. Multiple regressions were used to assess their impact on financial performance – specifically, return on assets, return on equity, asset turnover and market-to-book value.
Findings
Value-added intellectual coefficient components (i.e. human capital, structural capital and capital employed) significantly explained asset turnover and return on assets but failed to predict the return on equity outcome. Additionally, asset turnover was negatively influenced by structural capital and positively influenced by capital employed. The return on assets was mostly affected by variation in human capital. Intellectual capital did not predict market-to-book value or investment decisions.
Practical implications
This paper provides useful resources for evaluating the financial performance and value creation of companies in emerging economies that enjoy TRIPS exemptions; this research could also be extended using cross-industry comparisons. The findings have theoretical and practical implications, particularly for the pharmaceutical industry in emerging economy contexts, and for managers globally.
Originality/value
This study is among only a few that have reported on the relationship between intellectual capital efficiency and value creation in emerging economy contexts.
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Miroslav Mateev and Tarek Nasr
This paper aims to investigate the impact of capital requirements and bank competition on banks' risk-taking behavior in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region.
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to investigate the impact of capital requirements and bank competition on banks' risk-taking behavior in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region.
Design/methodology/approach
The study combines both descriptive and analytical approaches. It considers panel data sets and adopts panel data econometric techniques like fixed effects/random effects and generalized method of moments estimator.
Findings
Regulatory capital and market competition have different effects according to the bank’s type (Islamic or conventional). The results show that the capital adequacy ratio has a significant impact on the credit risk of conventional banks (CBs) while this effect is irrelevant for Islamic banks (IBs). However, market competition plays a significant role in shaping risk-taking behavior of Islamic banking institutions. Our results indicate that banks with strong market power may pursue risky strategies in the face of increased regulatory pressure (e.g. increased minimum capital requirements). The results were robust to alternative profitability measures and endogeneity checks.
Research limitations/implications
The most important limitation is the lack of data for some banks and years, and this paper had to exclude some variables because of missing observations. The second limitation concerns the number of IBs in the sample. However, this can be overcome by including more countries from MENA and other regions where Islamic banking is a growing phenomenon.
Practical implications
Our findings call for a change in Islamic banking’s traditional business model based on the prohibition of interest. The analysis indicates that market concentration moderates the association between capital requirements and the insolvency risk of IBs but not CBs. Therefore, regulatory authorities concerned with improving financial stability in the MENA region should set up their policies differently depending on the level of banking market concentration. Finally, bank managers are requested to apply a more disciplined approach to their lending decisions and build sufficient capital conservation buffers to limit the impact of downside risk from the depletion of capital buffers during the pandemic.
Originality/value
This study addresses banks’ risk-taking behavior and stability in the MENA region, which includes banks of different types (Islamic and conventional). This paper also contributes to the literature on bank stability by identifying the most critical factors that affect bank risk and stability in the MENA region, which can be relevant in the context of the new global (COVID-19) crisis.