Decision support models for managing food aid supply chains: A systematic literature review

We review existing decision support models (including statistical, simulation, and optimization models) aimed at addressing chronic food insecurity issue by enhancing the management of food aid supply chain systems. We exclusively classify the existing optimization-based decision support models into three different categories as per studies focusing on: (i) the facility location problem (decision making at the strategic level), (ii) the resource allocation problem (decision making at the tactical level), and (iii) the vehicle routing problem (decision making at the operational level). We also review various objective functions that have been defined for the foregoing problems whose focus are on equity, effectiveness, and efficiency of food distribution. We further summarize the constraints of these optimization problems which are related to the uncertainty of supply and demand, vehicles capacity, donated food items, frequency of food collections and deliveries, service sequence, and storage capacity of facilities. Finally, we review the solution methodologies that have been developed to solve the foregoing problems. In closing, we discuss potential opportunities for future research.