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We analyze the quality risk and outsourcing strategies in a three-tier low-carbon supply chain comprising an original equipment manufacturer (OEM), a contract manufacturer (CM) and a supplier under two competitive scenarios. The following two outsourcing strategies that are currently implemented by OEM are considered: consignment and turnkey. Under the consignment strategy, the OEM procures the components from the supplier and then outsources the product manufacturing to the CM. Under the turnkey strategy, the OEM outsources the component procurement and product manufacturing to the CM and CM procures the components from the supplier. We compare the quality level and two outsourcing strategies under non-competitive scenario in which the CM does not have its own brand products and competitive scenario in which the CM sells its own brand production. It is shown that, in the non-competitive scenario, OEM prefers the turnkey strategy than the consignment strategy in the low-carbon supply chain. In the competitive scenario, the OEM’s outsourcing strategy depends on the CM’s quality investment cost coefficient.

In the context of carbon tax-subsidy policy, our paper develops the models of the tripartite evolutionary game between consumers, manufacturers and local governments and analyzes the impacts of carbon tax-subsidy policy on the strategies of consumers, manufacturers and local governments. Through the construction of replicated dynamic equations, we get the evolutionary stable strategy. Then, the numerical analysis is performed with system dynamics simulation. The results show that (i) the local governments should strengthen the consumers’ awareness of environmental protection through higher financial subsidies, (ii) the taxation intensity coefficient accelerates the dynamic system to evolve into a stable state and (iii) an appropriate punishment by the government accelerates the dynamic system to evolve into a stable state. Our research is expected to provide a reference for local governments to implement effective carbon tax-subsidy policy on manufacturers.

In the context of cap-and-trade regulation, this paper develops the models of evolutionary game between governments and manufacturers, and analyzes the impacts of government policy on the decisions of manufacturers and the dynamic tendency of cap-and-trade market. It investigates the impacts of government policies on carbon trading market under two scenarios: the static carbon trading price and the dynamic carbon trading price. Under dynamic carbon trading price, the equilibrium strategy of the evolutionary game can be obtained. Then a numerical example is examined with system dynamics simulation. It is shown that, when governments implement the static carbon trading price, the evolutionary game cannot reach the stability. Under the dynamic carbon trading price, the evolutionary game has the evolutionary stable strategy. Dynamic carbon trading pricing policy is effective in accelerating the carbon reduction. Moreover, the probability of manufacturers introducing green technology is negatively correlated with governmental intervention costs and positively correlated with governmental penalty for manufacturers’ speculations.

Purpose This paper aims to analyze the impact of the cost coefficient of product emission reduction, coefficient of low-carbon product advertising effort cost, and sharing ratio of low-carbon product advertising effort cost on the profit of a dual-channel supply chain. After determining the best model and relevant influencing factors, the paper puts forward corresponding management inspirations and suggestions. Design/methodology/approach The paper opts for an exploratory study using Stackelberg game theory to construct a centralized decision-making (MC mode), a low carbon product advertising effort cost free sharing decentralized decision-making (SD model) and a low carbon product advertising effort cost sharing decentralized decision-making (JD model) game model. Through using optimization methods to get the equilibrium solution, the relevant management suggestions are obtained by comparison analysis. Findings The paper shows that the JD model is better than the SD model in terms of the profits of the manufacturer, retailer and supply chain, and the improvement of Pareto is realized. The proportion of cost sharing of low carbon product advertising effort is positively related to the wholesale price and direct influence coefficient of low carbon product advertising effort on channel, while negatively related to the retail price and the cross influence coefficient of low carbon product advertising effort on alternative channels. Under the JD model, the manufacturer can reduce advertising costs through improving the efficiency and pertinence of direct channel advertising and urging the retailer to do a better job in sales management to improve gross margin and require the retailer to increase advertising efficiency and pertinence of retail channel to reduce advertising costs of retail channel and other ways to increase their profits. The retailer can make use of its advantages closer with consumers to improve the efficiency and pertinence of advertising in the retail channel to raise the influence coefficient of advertising and reduce the advertising cost in the retail channel. Originality/value The innovations of this paper are listed as follows: First, it has considered advertising investment from both the manufacturer and the retailer simultaneously. Second, it has considered a low-carbon background to investigate cooperative advertising decision for low-carbon products. Third, it has considered the decision on the level of product emission reduction and the level of low-carbon product advertising effort investment simultaneously.

Considering the cap-and-trade regulation and manufacturer’s two types of strategies: adopting green technology (GT) and purchasing carbon credits (PC), we develop game models to investigate the manufacturer’s production and emission abatement decisions as well as the governmental emission cap regulation in a supply chain with three power structures (Manufacturer Stackelberg (MS), Retail Stackelberg (RS) and Vertical Nash (VN)), and analyze how a manufacturer’s low carbon strategy changes with the various governmental cap under the three supply chain power structures. The main conclusions are as follows. If the manufacturer adopts green technology strategy, supply chain power structure will not affect social welfare. High consumer’s low-carbon preference is more beneficial to the social welfare, the government should advocate the consumer’s preference for low carbon product. If the manufacturer purchases carbon credits, the government under the power structure of VN will gain the most social welfare.

Considering the influence of carbon emissions trading, the fuzzy stochastic programming model was established to cut back the total cost of carbon trading balance. Modeling this chain is carried out by accounting for carbon cap-and-trade considerations and total cost optimization. In this paper, we analyze the low-carbon integrated forward/reverse logistics network and made relevant simulation tests. The results show that the changes of the confidence level and carbon emission limits have obvious influences on logistics costs. If the emission limit is large, carbon trading mechanism has little effect on the total logistics cost in the same scenario. Therefore, the government needs to use the appropriate emission limits to guide enterprises to reduce carbon emissions, and enterprises can make coping strategies according to the different limit at the same time. Therefore, the fuzzy random programming model proposed in this paper is practical. Its decision making applying the proposed algorithm is reasonable and applicable and could provide decision basis for enterprise managers.