Towards Sustainable Campuses: A Novel Fermatean Fuzzy Decision-Making Model for EvaluatingZero-Waste Strategies in Universities

The objective of this study is to identify the most appropriate strategies to increase the effectiveness of zero-waste practices in universities and to fill the existing gap in the literature in this regard. To achieve this objective, a new multi-criteria decision-making model is developed. The model uses the evaluations of eight experts as a dataset; the experts' importance weights are determined using the Euclidean distance-based expert weighting technique, the criteria weights are calculated using the skewness impact through distributional evaluation (SITDE), and the strategic alternatives are ranked using simple additive weighting (SAW). Fermatean fuzzy sets approach is integrated into the model to address process uncertainties more flexibly and realistically. The proposed model contributes to the literature by distinguishing itself from existing models in terms of both expert weighting and the more effective management of uncertainty. The key findings indicate that the most important criterion is policy and governance support (.176), while the most suitable strategy is a strategy focused on education and aware-ness (.721), followed by a technology and digitalization-based strategy (.673). These results reveal that the success of zero waste policies in universities can reach the highest level if individual awareness is increased with strong institutional support.