An Integrated Neutrosophic SNA-MABAC Approach for Blockchain Applicability Evaluation in Sustainable Supply Chains

Abstract

The outbreak of the novel coronavirus pneumonia and the turbulent international situation in recent years have seriously disrupted the normal operation of the entire supply chain (SC). As an emerging technology, blockchain is characterized by decentralization, reliability, transparency and traceability, which can be effectively applied to solve social, environmental and economic concerns and achieve sustainability of supply chain. However, whether blockchain is suitable for every function of a sustainable supply chain (SSC), or what function is best suited for the application of a set of blockchain criteria, can be viewed as a multi-criteria group decision-making (MCGDM) problem. This paper presents a combined MCGDM technique utilizing the social network analysis (SNA) and Multi-Attributive Border Approximation Area Comparison (MABAC), for selecting an appropriate function of SSCs to implement blockchain technology with Neutrosophic information. The framework gives quantitative consideration to the weight of relevant blockchain criteria and decision makers under high uncertainty. This study can also facilitate the effective allocation of resources and enhance the competitiveness of SSCs in the coordinated planning of various blockchain deployments.