An Integrated Multi-Criteria Decision-Making Model Based on Prospect Theory for Green Supplier Selection under Uncertain Environment: A Case Study of the Thailand Palm Oil Products Industry

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The paper “An integrated MCDM model based on prospect theory for green supplier selection under uncertainty environment: A case study in Thailand palm oil products industry” contributes with an understanding of how information about the traveler’s context can enhance the support provided by travel planners. The content of the paper is adequate for the purposes of the journal.

Title: The title of the paper is informative. It includes important terms and the message of the article. Please avoid using abbreviations and acronyms in the title (MCDM).

Abstract: The abstract describes the context and follow the structure: backgrounds, methods, results and conclusions.

Keywords: OK.

Introduction. Introduction defines the focus and the research questions.

Literature review: The literature review supports to understand the correlation of presented research results with literature. I suggest you to read articles in the “Energy Efficiency in the Supply Chains and Logistics” special issue of Energies Journal of mdpi: https://www.mdpi.com/journal/energies/special_issues/energy_efficiency_logistics and add some energy efficiency related aspects to the literature review.

Materials and methods. The methodology is extensively discussed. The case study validates the model.

Discussion and conclusions: Clear and adequate.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 1,

We are very grateful to Reviewer for their valuable comments and suggestions that have much improved the manuscript. In the revised manuscript, we have carefully addressed these comments and suggestions, and these revisions are marked in red. The following is summary of the main revisions, and we have made in response to the referees’ comments as per attached file.

Best regards,

Authors.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

I was pleased to read your study and I believe it raises interesting insights. The paper deals with a topic of key interest and the content of the paper seems adequate for the purposes of the journal. As reported in the introduction, the aim of the paper is very ambitious since it aims to address many interesting issues. Nevertheless, the manuscript presents some limitations that should be addressed. My main suggestions are the following:

-          During the reading of the work I expected to find a justification by the authors about how propose a new approach for supplier selection and therefore, the limitations of the existing methodologies

-          As for the literature review section, the authors should clarify how the review process has been conducted as well as the papers selected to justify the methodology. This guarantees that the authors have not overlooked some relevant papers in the analysis of the theoretical background. Specifically, authors focus on the supplier selection problem and proposed a DEMATEL-ANP methodology to address it. However, many references addressing the supplier selection problem using one of the methodologies the authors integrated are missing (e.g.  Bottani et al., 2018. A QFD-ANP Method for Supplier Selection with Benefits, Opportunities, Costs and Risks Considerations; Jiang et al., 2018 Green supplier selection for sustainable development of the automotive industry using grey decision-making; Govindan et al. 2016. Supplier selection based on corporate social responsibility practices).

-          I would suggest expanding conclusions section stressing limitations, managerial and policy implications of the study.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 2

We are very grateful to Reviewer for their valuable comments and suggestions that have much improved the manuscript. In the revised manuscript, we have carefully addressed these comments and suggestions, and these revisions are marked in red. The following is summary of the main revisions, and we have made in response to the referees’ comments as per attached file.

Best & regards,

Authors.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Thanks for giving me the opportunity to read the paper “An integrated MCDM model based on prospect theory for green supplier selection under uncertainty environment: A case study in Thailand palm oil products industry”. The main contribution of this paper is to apply the integrated multi-criteria decision method using fuzzy decision making trial and evaluation laboratory (fuzzy DEMATEL) to consider the cause and effect relationship and then using fuzzy analytic network process (fuzzy ANP) to assign the weight of each relevant criteria.Although the work addresses a topic of general interest and the methodology is very original, the paper shows weaknesses in several dimensions, which prevent publication of research in its current form. As for the literature background, the literature research gap is neither properly discussed nor documented using extant research. As for the methodological approach, authors claim that methodology is based on fuzzy set theory. Which are the theoretical foundations of such approach? This paper adopts the fuzzy set theory approach firstly proposed by Lotfi Zadeh in 1965. Therefore, in addition to Zadeh (1965), Watanabe (1993) as well as  the most recent contributions of Centobelli et al. (2018) on fuzzy methodology and fuzzy-based  decision support system should be reported in the paper to justify the use of fuzzy logic. Specifically, Centobelli et al. proposed the adoption of fuzzy set theory in the field of SMEs operating in  a supply chain, and designed a fuzzy-based decision support system. I suggest to include these papers to justify your methodological approach to deal with decision making using fuzzy logic method. Centobelli, P. et al. (2018). How to deal with knowledge management misalignment: a taxonomy based on a 3D fuzzy methodology Journal of Knowledge Management, Vol. 22 Issue: 3, pp.538-566. Watanabe, N. (1979). Statistical Methods for Estimating Membership Functions. Japanese Journal of Fuzzy Theory and Systems, 5, 4. In addition, the authors are using a definition of the fuzzy set theory according to these previous methodological contributions. Methodology should be based on extant theory and described more in details to clarify if and how the application converge or diverge from standard fuzzy set approach. Authors should spend more time to discuss the codification into fuzzy numbers. Some limitations of the article should be reported in the concluding section

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 3,

We are very grateful to Reviewer for their valuable comments and suggestions that have much improved the manuscript. In the revised manuscript, we have carefully addressed these comments and suggestions, and these revisions are marked in red. The following is summary of the main revisions, and we have made in response to the referees’ comments as per attached file.

Best & regard,

Authors.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

I am satisfied with your response. Good luck for your research