Investigating the impact of integrated supply chain forecasting on the supply chain performance : empirical study from the FMCGS sector in Egypt

Abstract EN

Organizations have become progressively aware of the fact that the success and sustainability of their own business are strongly dependent on the collaboration and coordination with their suppliers and customers; particularly in terms of information sharing.

Companies that manage the Supply Chain (SC) as a single entity and guarantee the suitable use of forecasting tools and techniques in order to meet the demand and needs of the market will not get left behind in the fight for survival.

This research aims at proposing an applied framework linking and showing the impact of integrated SC forecasting on the SC performance.

An empirical study is conducted on the Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCGs) sector in Egypt in two multinational companies: Procter & Gamble and Nestle, and one national company: Sakr Group which is currently engaged in collaborative forecasting with its SC partners.

The empirical study first started with semi-structured interviews to provide an overview of the FMCGs supply chain and analyze its characteristics in the Egyptian market.

Then, a semi-structured survey is designed and carried out to gain an insight into the implementation and the relevance of the variables enhancing integrated SC forecasting in the Egyptian FMCGs industry.

Based on the survey results, an applied framework is developed to link the integrated SC forecasting to supply chain performance.

Finally, in-depth interviews are carried out to verify the relationship between integrated SC forecasting and SC performance based on the applied framework.

The results identify Information Sharing, Information Quality and Information Technology as the main variables to implement integrated SC forecasting.

In addition, the results prove that an integrated SC forecasting has a positive impact on the SC performance, and hence on the overall organization performance.