Promoting the concept of viability in agri-food supply chains

The rapid adaptation, and the reconfiguration of processes and structures, is necessary in response to unpredictable disruptions of supply chains. Sustainability and resilience are seen as the most promising approaches for dealing with the occurring disruptions. Both concepts focus on the ways in which supply chains should modify their functions to sufficiently respond to external or internal disturbances. Supply chains also need to reconfigure their long-term strategies to support their place in the market and preserve competitive advantage. The recently proposed concept of viability comes to reset the goals of the supply chain systems, aiming to ensure the long-term effectiveness of the measures taken while dealing with a crisis. This paper aims to define the concept of viability in the context of agri-food supply chains and propose interventions and ways of adoption for the existing supply chain systems.