Publication Type
Journal Article
Version
submittedVersion
Publication Date
12-2017
Abstract
This paper examines the capacity investment decisions of a processor that uses a commodity input to produce both a commodity output and a byproduct in the context of agricultural industries. We employ a multi-period model to study the optimal one-time processing and (output) storage capacity investment decisions---in addition to the periodic processing and inventory decisions---when both input and output spot prices as well as production yield are uncertain. We characterize the optimal decisions and perform sensitivity analysis to investigate how spot price uncertainty affects the processor's optimal capacity and profitability. Using a calibration based on the palm industry, we study (both numerically and analytically) the performance of a variety of heuristic capacity investment policies that can be used in practice. We find that if the yield uncertainty is ignored in capacity planning, then basing those plans on the average yield is preferable to basing them (as often occurs in practice) on the maximum yield. However, planning based on the average yield performs well only when the relative (processing-to-storage) capacity investment cost is high, otherwise it leads to a significant loss of profit. We also find that ignoring spot price uncertainty in capacity planning results in a relatively small profit loss. In contrast, ignoring byproduct revenue---which constitutes a small portion of total revenues---during capacity planning substantially reduces the processor's profit.
Keywords
capacity management, multi-product firm, commodity risk management, spot market, agriculture, dynamic programming, processing, storage
Discipline
Agribusiness | Operations and Supply Chain Management
Research Areas
Operations Management
Publication
Manufacturing and Service Operations Management
First Page
1
Last Page
39
ISSN
1523-4614
Identifier
10.1287/msom.2017.0624
Publisher
INFORMS (Institute for Operations Research and Management Sciences)
Embargo Period
10-22-2014
Citation
BOYABATLI, Onur; NGUYEN, Jason Quang Dang; and WANG, Tong.
Capacity Management in Agricultural Commodity Processing and Application in the Palm Industry. (2017). Manufacturing and Service Operations Management. 1-39.
Available at: https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/lkcsb_research/3188
Copyright Owner and License
Authors
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.
Unabridged version
Additional URL
https://doi.org/10.1287/msom.2017.0624