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Cold supply chains or cold-chain systems are emerging rapidly in China. This chapter presents an overview of cold-chain systems in China, including those in fresh agricultural products, frozen processed products, and biopharmaceutical products. The rapid growth of the cold-chain supply systems emphasizes the need to establish integrated systems. We attempt to explain the integration of cold supply chains in China. This chapter is based on case studies of cold-chain companies in China within the framework of value-chain analysis. Recent integrations of cold-chain suppliers in China are reviewed along with the rationales behind the integration in terms of value creation. The findings will be of use for cold-chain practitioners and policy-makers to understand the observed behaviors of cold-chain systems. Practitioners will also be able to use the findings to guide supply chain integration decisions. This study will guide policy-makers and other stakeholders to manage the sustainable development of cold-chain systems.

This paper models shipping lines’ operational costs and CO2 emissions under alternative geographic network configurations when an emission charge is imposed on operations from Asia to Europe. Our modeling results suggest that shipping firms’ network configuration is influenced by emission charge, fuel price, port loading and unloading cost, and demand pattern of cargo transport across different markets. Total emission will be reduced by an EU emission charge scheme. However, if the charge is above a threshold, carriers will reconfigure shipping networks to minimize their costs including emission charge payments. This will offset part of the emission reduction achieved by the emission scheme. As a result, a higher charge does not always lead to a higher emission reduction. In addition, the performance of major ports along the Asia-Europe routes will be influenced in different ways, leading to conflicting views from regional governments. These findings reveal possible market distortions associated with regional emission systems, and highlight the complex effects of international environmental policies when market dynamics are considered.

This paper proposes a fuzzy logic based approach for ship-bridge collision alert by considering ship particulars, bridge parameters and natural environment. It can be implemented in the decision support system for safe navigation or be included in the process of autonomous navigation. The ship-bridge collision conditions are analysed by considering the ship location, ship trajectory direction, ship distance to the bridge and ship speed. These factors, together with the natural environment, are treated as the input variables. The IF-THEN rules are then established after fuzzification of the input variables and are used for fuzzy inference to derive the ship-bridge collision risk. From the result analysis, the proposed approach can be used for improvement of the ship handling in the bridge waterway area.

This paper proposes a fuzzy logic based approach for ship-bridge collision alert by considering ship particulars, bridge parameters and natural environment. It can be implemented in the decision support system for safe navigation or be included in the process of autonomous navigation. The ship-bridge collision conditions are analysed by considering the ship location, ship trajectory direction, ship distance to the bridge and ship speed. These factors, together with the natural environment, are treated as the input variables. The IF-THEN rules are then established after fuzzification of the input variables and are used for fuzzy inference to derive the ship-bridge collision risk. From the result analysis, the proposed approach can be used for improvement of the ship handling in the bridge waterway area.