Sustainable Paths in Digital Supply Chains: Navigating Environmental Challenges and Technological Frontiers
The contemporary business landscape is undergoing profound transformation as organizations respond to rapid technological advancements, intensifying environmental pressures, and recurring global disruptions. Digitalization has emerged as a critical enabler of supply chain adaptation, yet its integration with sustainability objectives remains uneven and fragmented. The special issue titled “Sustainable Paths in Digital Supply Chains: Navigating Environmental Challenges and Technological Frontiers” seeks to advance scholarly and practical understanding of how digital technologies can be strategically leveraged to embed sustainability within modern supply chains.
This special issue explores the mutually reinforcing relationship between emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence, blockchain, and advanced data analytics and sustainable supply chain practices. As organizations confront escalating climate risks, regulatory scrutiny, and operational volatility, digital tools offer opportunities to enhance transparency, efficiency, emissions monitoring, and resilience. However, technological adoption alone is insufficient. Sustainable digital transitions require supportive leadership, continuous training, and organizational culture transformation. Drawing on theoretical lenses including the Practice-Based View, Resource-Based View (RBV), Knowledge-Based View (KBV), evolutionary theory, and Organizational Information Processing Theory (OIPT), the issue provides a multi-level perspective on sustainability-driven digitalization.
In today’s globalized environment, sustainable digital supply chains represent more than operational optimization; they embody a strategic commitment to long-term environmental stewardship and responsible growth. Firms, particularly small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), face mounting pressure to reduce carbon footprints, ensure ethical sourcing, and improve supply network transparency. Digital transformation can enable traceability, real-time performance monitoring, predictive analytics, and collaborative platforms that strengthen both sustainability and resilience. Yet empirical synthesis remains limited, and conceptual fragmentation persists regarding how human and organizational factors influence successful digital sustainability transitions.
The topic is especially timely given increasing climate urgency, geopolitical instability, and post-pandemic supply chain restructuring. Recent research underscores the transformative potential of digital technologies in enhancing sustainability and resilience, but systematic integration of leadership, training, and cultural dimensions remains underexplored. By bridging theory and practice, this special issue invites empirical, conceptual, and methodological contributions that offer actionable insights for organizations seeking to navigate environmental challenges while leveraging technological frontiers.
Beyond academic advancement, this special issue addresses pressing societal challenges, including climate change mitigation, responsible production, energy efficiency, and ethical governance. It aligns closely with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, notably SDG 9 (Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure), SDG 12 (Responsible Consumption and Production), SDG 13 (Climate Action), and SDG 8 (Decent Work and Economic Growth). By fostering interdisciplinary dialogue among scholars, practitioners, and policymakers, the issue aims to shape sustainable industrial development and promote resilient, digitally enabled supply chain ecosystems.
List of Topic Areas
- Strategic leadership and governance for sustainable digital supply chains
- Digital transformation strategies for environmental sustainability in supply chains
- AI and machine learning applications for green supply chain planning and optimization
- Blockchain-enabled transparency, traceability, and ethical sourcing
- Benchmarking sustainability performance metrics and ESG KPIs in digital supply chain
- Sustainable logistics and smart transportation
- Digital circular supply chains and circular economy implementation models
- Green procurement, supplier collaboration, and sustainable sourcing practices
- Sustainability-resilience integration through digital capabilities
- Sustainable supply chain innovation in SMEs and emerging economies
- Cyber risks, data governance, and trust issues in sustainable digital supply chains
- Policy, institutional pressures, and regulatory compliance for digital sustainability
- Benchmarking best practices in AI-driven sustainable supply chain decision-making
- Cross-industry and cross-country benchmarking of digital sustainability maturity models
- Benchmarking circular economy adoption and reverse logistics performance across sectors.
Guest Editors
Harshad Sonar, Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Sambalpur, India. harshad@iimsambalpur.ac.in
Bishal Dey Sarkar, Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Bodhgaya, India. bishal.s@iimbg.ac.in
Sandeep Jagtap, Lund University, Sweden. sandeep.jagtap@tlog.lth.se
Hana Trollman, University of Leicester, UK. ht203@leicester.ac.uk
Submissions Information
Submissions are made using ScholarOne Manuscripts. Author guidelines must be strictly followed.
Authors should select (from the drop-down menu) the special issue title at the appropriate step in the submission process, i.e. in response to “Please select the issue you are submitting to”. Submitted articles must not have been previously published, nor should they be under consideration for publication anywhere else, while under review for this journal.
Key Deadlines
Opening date for manuscripts submissions: 15th March 2026
Closing date for manuscripts submission: 30th September 2026
For more details refer here
