External Integration and Sustainable Supply Chain Performance of Bottle Water Manufacturing Firms in Rivers State
- March 20, 2021
- Posted by: RSIS
- Categories: IJRSI, Marketing
International Journal of Research and Scientific Innovation (IJRSI) | Volume VIII, Issue II, February 2021 | ISSN 2321–2705
Harcourt Horsfall (Ph.D.) , Ikegwuru Mac-Kingsley (Ph.D)
Department of Marketing, Rivers State University, Port Harcourt, Nigeria
Abstract: This study focused on external integration and sustainable supply chain performance of bottle water manufacturing firms in Rivers State of Nigeria; expressly to discover the influence of external integration on sustainable supply chain performance. A causal design research model was originated to take on board the two (2) hypotheses put together for the study. The population of the study was 79 bottle water manufacturing firms in Rivers State and the Taro Yemen’s formula was used to mock-up 47 firms out of the population. The simple random sampling technique was adopted to select five (5) respondents per firm to arrive at 235 respondents. A 5-point likert-scale questionnaire was administered to respondents, of which 200 copies of the questionnaire were returned, obtaining an 85 percent response rate. The study adopted descriptive statistics; Pearson’s Product Moment Correlation Coefficient, Simple regression and analysis of variance formats to establish that external integration dimensions; customer integration, and suppliers’ integration were valuable in influencing sustainable supply chain performance of bottle water manufacturing firms in Rivers State of Nigeria. The results exposes that customer integration has a moderate, positive and significant influence on sustainable supply chain performance. The findings also, designates that suppliers integration has a moderate, positive and significant influence on sustainable supply chain performance. As such, the study recognizes external integration as a catalyst that predicts sustainable supply chain performance, and concludes that, external integration positively and significantly influences sustainable supply chain performance of bottle water manufacturing firms in Rivers State of Nigeria and recommends amongst others that, Managers of bottle water manufacturing firms should position strategically, suppliers integration to achieve definitive sustainable supply chain performance.
Key Words: Customer integration, External integration, Supplier integration, Sustainable supply chain performance.
