Track: Undergraduate Student Paper Competition

Abstract

Nowadays, the call to go green is getting stronger than ever. Numerous environmental issues are constantly arising, leading to various laws and regulations to address the problem. Companies and organizations are trying to integrate sustainability into their business processes. The construction industry, one of the largest industries, also encounters the same scenario. This study aims to bridge the gap between sustainability and the construction industry by developing a sustainable supplier selection tool. The researchers chose the country of the Philippines as the location. Sustainability is incorporated using the triple bottom-line framework. The triple-bottom-line framework consists of environmental, economic, and social dimensions. This framework allows a holistic view of the necessary things for prioritization and not on profitability alone. Existing literature and studies were found to determine the sub-criteria for each of the three dimensions. The economic dimension garnered a total of 15 sub-criteria, the social dimension has a total of 10 sub-criteria, and 12 sub-criteria were determined for the environmental dimension, which sums up to 37 sub-criteria. A total of 100 respondents have participated with online survey questionnaires. Using factor analysis, the researchers were able to compress the 37 sub-criteria into eight sub-criteria: four sub-criteria under economic criterion, two sub-criteria under social criterion, and two sub-criteria under environmental criterion. Moreover, Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP), a multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) tool, was employed to determine the relative weights, which corresponds to importance, of each sub-criterion. At the end, the researchers were able to develop a tool using Excel Visual Basic Application to determine the best sustainable supplier given the set of criteria.