The food supply chain in South Africa faces significant challenges related to transparency, traceability, and consumer trust. As concerns about food safety, quality, and sustainability grow, there is an increasing need for innovative solutions to address these issues. Blockchain technology has emerged as a promising tool to enhance transparency and accountability across various industries, including the food sector. This study sought to explore the potential of blockchain technology in revolutionizing through promoting transparency that enable the achievement of sustainable food supply chain infrastructure in South Africa. The study found that blockchain technology used in food supply chain creates an immutable and decentralized ledger of transactions that has the capacity to provide real-time, end-to-end visibility of food products from farm to table. This increased transparency can help mitigate risks associated with food fraud, contamination, and inefficiencies in the supply chain. The study found that blockchain technology can be leveraged to enhance supply chain efficiency and trust among stakeholders. This technology used and/or applied in South Africa can reshape the agricultural sector by improving production and distribution processes. Its integration in the food supply chain infrastructure can equally improve data management and increase transparency between farmers and food suppliers.There is need for policy-makers and scholars in the fields of service delivery and food security to conduct more research in blockchain technology and its roles in creating a more transparent, efficient, and trustworthy food supply chain infractructure that address food supply problems in South Africa. The paper adopted a qualitative methodology to collect data, and document and content analysis techniques were used to interpret collected data. 

In the past twenty years, market dynamics have had a substantial impact on different industrial sectors, ultimately influencing their level of competitiveness. The field of operation management in terms of halal logistics has gained considerable attention and recognition among scholars and researchers in the academic community, as evidenced by the growing body of literature in the field of management. This article presents a bibliometric examination of scholarly literature pertaining to the halal supply chain in the domain of business. In addition, bibliographic material is organized and analyzed through the utilization of software tools such as VOSviewer, R Studio, and Microsoft Excel. A comprehensive analysis was conducted on a dataset comprising 278 scholarly papers that had been indexed by Scopus. The process of identifying and categorizing relevant research on the topic was carried out using certain criteria, including journal publications, articles, authorship, and geographical origin. The results suggest a significant rise in scholarly investigations carried out in this specific domain during the previous two decades. Our study also acknowledges several countries as the most productive domains of halal supply chain studies. It is imperative to recognize, though, that scientific advancement continues in this field, as well as in all other areas of study, and that data undergoes significant changes over time. This article examines potential avenues for future research, incorporating quantitative analysis and collaborative inquiry undertaken by researchers.

This study aims to investigate the relationship between internal and information integration within the supply chain (SCI-INTI and SCI-INFI), supply chain management (SCM) practices, and port operational performance (POP) in Oman’s container ports. Additionally, it explores the mediating role of SCM practices in the relationship between SCI-INTI, SCI-INFI, and POP in Oman. To meet the study’s objectives, a quantitative cross-sectional survey method was used. A total of 377 questionnaires were distributed to managers responsible for supply chain operations in the main departments at Sohar and Salalah ports, yielding 331 usable responses, with a response rate of 88 percent. The data collected were analyzed using partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM). The results show that both internal and information integration within the supply chain have positive and statistically significant effects on the operational performance of Oman’s container ports (POP). Specifically, Supply Chain Integration with Internal Integration (SCI-INTI) significantly impacts POP (β = 0.249, t = 5.039, p < 0.001), and Supply Chain Integration with Information Integration (SCI-INFI) also significantly affects POP (β = 0.259, t = 4.966, p < 0.001). Additionally, SCI-INTI positively influences Supply Chain Management Practices (SCMP) (β = 0.381, t = 7.674, p < 0.001), as does SCI-INFI (β = 0.484, t = 9.878, p < 0.001). Furthermore, SCMP positively and significantly influences the operational performance of Oman’s container ports (β = 0.424, t = 7.643, p < 0.001). These findings contribute to the literature by emphasizing the significance of internal and information integration within the supply chain and SCM practices as strategic internal resources and capabilities that enhance operational performance in container ports. Understanding these elements enables decision-makers and policymakers within government port authorities and port operating companies to optimize internal resources and capabilities to improve port operational performance.

The presence of a crisis has consistently been an inherent aspect of the Supply Chain, mostly as a result of the substantial number of stakeholders involved and the intricate dynamics of their relationships. The objective of this study is to assess the potential of Big Data as a tool for planning risk management in Supply Chain crises. Specifically, it focuses on using computational analysis and modeling to quantitatively analyze financial risks. The “Web of Science—Elsevier” database was employed to fulfill the aims of this work by identifying relevant papers for the investigation. The data were inputted into VOS viewer, a software application used to construct and visualize bibliometric networks for subsequent research. Data processing indicates a significant rise in the quantity of publications and citations related to the topic over the past five years. Moreover, the study encompasses a wide variety of crisis types, with the COVID-19 pandemic being the most significant. Nevertheless, the cooperation among institutions is evidently limited. This has limited the theoretical progress of the field and may have contributed to the ambiguity in understanding the research issue.