Closed-loop supply chain and extended producer responsibility (EPR): A literature review

Abstract

Environmental impact problems from industrial activities imply a great risk for the sustainability of societies and ecosystems of the future. In this sense, in recent years have grown the awareness and the need to generate concrete actions that improve this panorama. That is why many countries in their regulations and international treaties have focused on promoting these actions in pursuit of more environmentally friendly industrial activity. One of these rules is extended producer responsibility (EPR), in which the producer, as well as other relevant actors in the supply chain, are required to take responsibility for the impact of their industrial activities on the environment. In this way, companies must devise different strategies to minimize the impact or to mitigate it if it cannot be avoided, so that the market prices of the products represent not only the manufacturing and distribution of the products, but the entire life cycle of the product, such as the resulting waste management costs. In this work, a review of the literature in this regard is proposed. This review analyzes the literature on the subject with special emphasis on how the loop is closed in supply chains and how operations are planned with a view to reducing waste and environmental impacts.