Conclusion

Abstract

The following chapter presents the concluding discussion of the preceding results. First, a synthesis of the results will be given. Afterwards, the contributions to the domain of sustainable freight transport will be outlined. The chapter closes with a short outlook and some suggestions for further research.

7.1 Synthesis of Results

This research uses an intense stakeholder dialogue with logistics companies to investigate the determinants of sustainable freight transport acceptance and identify user-centric policy measures to promote sustainable freight transport. A comparison of the determinants of acceptance and the suggested policy measures shows that each policy measure addresses a determinant of acceptance. Table 7.1 juxtaposes the determinants of acceptance and the policy measures and gives the underlying theoretical support as argued in Section 6.3.5.

Table 7.1 Comparison of determinants of acceptance and policy measures for sustainable freight transport

LSPs’ need for profitability can be addressed by monetary instruments such as the internalization of external costs or subsidies. These instruments will reduce the initial cost for establishing sustainable freight transport which will motivate companies to try and test sustainable practices. In the medium and long term, the costs for realizing the sustainable practices will decline automatically due to the market uptake of these practices and funding will not be required anymore.

Customer demand is an important driver for LSPs’ acceptance to implement sustainable freight transport strategies. Customers’ demand for sustainable freight transport can be evoked by awareness raising measures which create consciousness and a positive attitude towards sustainable practices. Managers buying transport services from LSPs must be aware that their buying decision has an enormous impact on the sustainable development of the transport system. This study revealed that hardly any LSP offers sustainable options without being requested to do so. This holds true for all three pillars of sustainable transport—avoid, shift as well as improve. During the empirical investigations it turned out that none of the sustainable strategies under study in this thesis would be established without customers (i.e. shippers) asking for environmentally friendly transport. Awareness raising is therefore a highly important instrument.

A policy measure that is related to awareness raising is education & training. Both, awareness raising and education & training target the creation of knowledge. While awareness raising creates theoretical knowledge and consciousness, education & training aims for practical knowledge and application-oriented skills to promote the implementation of sustainable practices. If LSPs have practical knowledge on how to operate sustainable transport, customers are encouraged to demand sustainable transport from them because they trust in the capabilities of the LSPs.

A basic prerequisite to realize sustainable freight transport (and thus a fundamental determinant of its acceptance) is the presence of the required infrastructure. In many cases, the implementation of sustainable practices is hampered simply because the infrastructure is missing. Policy should therefore accelerate the development of appropriate infrastructure and equipment. For example, they can fund the construction of infrastructure and announce public tenders for that purpose. This ensures that the resources required for sustainable freight transport are available.

Organizational efforts have been identified as another determinant of sustainable freight transport acceptance. If LSPs perceive it as complex to introduce sustainable practices, they will hesitate to do so. It turned out that many stakeholders perceive sustainable freight transport markets as non-transparent and difficult to enter. To reduce the perceived complexity, information and transparency about the organization, operation and performance of sustainable freight transport need to be provided. This transparency needs to be dictated by public authorities because transport providers will most probably not supply the required information on a voluntary basis.

Finally, the legal framework determines the acceptance of sustainable freight transport. Legal conditions can favor sustainable practices, e.g. they may give special permissions and preferential treatment to sustainable freight transport. As an example, truck transports within multimodal operations may be privileged by the granting of higher weight permissions. Another example is that LNG trucks are sometimes allowed to enter low-emission zones in city centers. However, the legal framework can also prevent the dissemination of sustainable freight strategies, for example in the case of cumbersome admission procedures. Policy measures should therefore target the creation of favorable legal framework conditions for logistics companies to introduce sustainable freight transport.

The preceding explanations in Subchapter 6.2 showed the existence of severe market failures in the sustainable freight transport market. It was demonstrated that due to these market failures, LSPs currently do not have an incentive for introducing sustainable freight strategies. For example, LSPs are reluctant to use sustainable practices because they do not (exclusively) benefit from the positive effects of introducing sustainable freight transport. This problem is known as the tragedy of the commons. Some LSPs also feel that there is no need for them to apply sustainable strategies because others might care for the environmental problems and shoulder this responsibility (free-rider behavior). Another problem is that there is imperfect information, such that many stakeholders do not possess the appropriate knowledge about sustainable freight transport. Finally, the existence of externalities hampers sustainable freight transport because the costs of environmental pollution are not reflected in transport prices (Figure 7.1).

Figure 7.1

Comparison of market failures and policy measures

The identified policy measures are able to minimize some of the market failures that currently exist in the sustainable freight transport market. For example, awareness raising measures can be used to create consciousness for common goods and prevent companies from exploiting these common resources such as air quality. The originator of the tragedy of commons, Garrett Hardin (1968), mentioned that there is no technical solution to overcome the economic problem of resource depletion. Instead, Hardin (1968, p. 1243) suggested that “a fundamental extension of morality” would be necessary to address the tragedy of commons. In fact, it has been proposed that sustainability problems should be framed as moral scarcity issue and not only as resource scarcity issue (Brown et al., 2019). Thus, moral norms need to be developed to fight collective exploitation of common goods. Awareness raising measures are able to deliver moral norms and communicate ethic principles of sustainability.

To resolve the information failure that currently dominates sustainable freight transport, education and training is an appropriate measure. Education and training creates knowledge and thus removes imperfect information. Having better information and expertise in the field of sustainable freight transport will support LSPs to introduce environmentally friendly practices. Another information failure in sustainable freight transport markets is asymmetric information. Asymmetric information exists because some parties have better information on sustainable freight transport than other parties. This problem can be addressed by stipulating information and transparency for all players in the market. For example, shippers should have access to all required information on multimodal transport, e.g. service providers, costs, timetables, performance parameters, etc.

Finally, the existence of negative externalities can be prevented by using monetary instruments which aim to internalize external costs. Monetary instruments enforce the “polluter pays principle” and thus charge the causing of negative externalities. This creates a level playing field among all transport modes because external costs become part of the decision makers’ choice process. At the moment, only direct costs such as operational costs, taxes or travel time opportunity cost are considered within the selection of a transport service (Márquez and Cantillo, 2013). The external costs (which are currently borne by society) are not adequately reflected in transport prices. The price of sustainable freight transport is therefore too high and must be altered by monetary instruments (emission charging, taxes, etc.).

7.2 Responses to the Research Questions

Based on the findings of this thesis, the research questions can be answered as follows. The first research question (which sustainable freight transport strategies exist to reduce the negative environmental impact of freight transport?) is answered by introducing the ASI framework (Chapter 4). The ASI framework is a well-known approach to classify strategies for sustainable freight transport. According to the ASI approach, there exist three main strategies to decarbonize freight transport, each of which represents a pillar of the framework: to avoid transport, to shift transport, and to improve transport (Figure 7.2). The papers of this thesis refer to three particular strategies, each of which addresses one of the three aforementioned pillars. Plasch et al. (2021) discuss horizontal collaboration in a PI network (avoid pillar), Pfoser (in press) elucidates multimodal freight transport (shift pillar) and Pfoser et al. (2018d) / Pfoser et al. (2016a) address LNG as an alternative fuel (improve pillar). It has been shown that all of these strategies are suitable and highly promising to reduce the negative environmental impact of freight transport, though their approach on how to achieve this goal is quite different. Horizontal collaboration has the potential to better utilize transport resources and reduce empty runs, and thereby reduce the environmental burden of transport. Multimodal freight transport is the combined use of multiple transport modes in a way such that the strengths of each mode can be utilized and the weaknesses can be compensated by the other mode(s). In this sense, multimodality creates better conditions for the use of sustainable transport modes, such as railways or waterways. And finally, LNG is at present the only viable alternative fuel for heavy-duty vehicles and long-haul transports. The technology for LNG is mature and readily available on the market, while other alternative fuels are still in a stage of development.

Figure 7.2

Overview of sustainable freight transport strategies

Though European politics shows strong commitment for all of the three strategies presented in Figure 7.2, they have not succeeded so far in promoting the acceptance and use of these strategies. Therefore, the second research question is framed as follows: Which determinants influence the acceptance of sustainable freight transport strategies?. Theoretical support for answering the second research questions comes from the technology acceptance model. The technology acceptance model (Davis, 1989) is a widely used theory to explain why decision makers adopt a specific technology or behavior. TAM postulates that two main determinants influence acceptance: the perceived usefulness and the perceived ease of use. The sub research questions regarding the acceptance of PI, multimodality and LNG (RQ 2.1–RQ 2.3) were answered by providing the individual determinants for these transport strategies (Table 5.2). Plasch et al. (2021) describe the motives to collaborate in a PI network, which are used to derive knowledge on the determinants of PI acceptance (RQ 2.1). Pfoser (in press) elaborates on the barriers to multimodality, which are used to derive the determinants of multimodality acceptance (RQ 2.2). Finally, Pfoser et al. (2018d) and Pfoser et al. (2016a) reveal the determinants of LNG acceptance (RQ 2.3). The individual determinants elaborated for each strategy were compared in Chapter 5 to derive overarching determinants of sustainable freight transport acceptance. Five main determinants were identified which influence the acceptance of avoid, shift and improve strategies (Figure 7.3). These determinants are profitability and customer demand (both of which refer to usability), as well as availability of infrastructure, organizational efforts and legal framework (which refer to the ease of using sustainable freight transport). These five determinants present the answer to the second research question.

Figure 7.3

Determinants of sustainable freight transport acceptance

The third research question in this thesis examines which market failures occur in the area of sustainable freight transport and currently distort the acceptance of sustainable strategies (RQ 3). According to neoclassical welfare economics, the presence of market failures justifies the use of policy instruments to intervene in the markets (Al-Saleh and Mahroum, 2015). Four types of market failures were identified in Chapter 6.2, namely the tragedy of commons, the existence of externalities, information failure and free-rider behavior. The policy measures developed in the thesis should address and solve these market failures.

The fourth and final research question in this thesis is dedicated to the development of user-centric policy measures. Organizational theories were used as theoretical foundation to explain the mechanisms which drive transport users to adopt sustainable practices. These theories reveal that three main dimensions support the adoption of sustainable freight transport, namely (1) organizational obligations, (2) organizational capabilities and (3) organizational functioning. It can be concluded that policy measures should address these three dimensions to set mechanisms which effectively promote sustainable practices.

Based on a user-centric approach involving numerous LSPs, concrete suggestions for policy measures were developed. The sub research questions regarding policy measures to promote the PI, multimodality and LNG (RQ 4.1– RQ 4.3) were answered by providing individual policy measures for these three transport strategies (Table 6.2). Plasch et al. (2021) describe the success factors to collaborate in a PI network, which are used to derive policy measures for PI (RQ 4.1). Pfoser (in press) develops policy measures to promote multimodality (RQ 4.2). Finally, Pfoser et al. (2018d) and Pfoser et al. (2016a) suggest policy measures to foster LNG (RQ 4.3). The individual policy measures elaborated for each strategy were compared in Chapter 6 to derive overarching policy measures to promote sustainable freight transport. Due to the user-centric approach, it appeared that the common sticks-carrots-sermons classification previously used to categorize policy measures does not meet transport users’ needs. Instead, a new typology is suggested, namely carrots-means-sermons. This typology provides an answer for the fourth research question (which policy measures promote the implementation of sustainable freight transport strategies?): on the one hand, monetary instruments (“carrots”) may push environmental practices. On the other hand, the provision of basic infrastructure and framework conditions (“means”) is an important impetus to implement sustainable strategies. Infrastructure development, information & transparency and the adaptation of the legal framework constitute means. Finally, the third category of policy instruments aims to create consciousness, knowledge and understanding to promote sustainable freight transport (“sermons”). Sermons are the least restrictive type of policy measures since they do not force or push any behavior, but rather suggest or recommend a specific behavior. Activities for awareness raising and education & training fall within this type of policy measure.

7.3 Contributions to the Domain of Sustainable Freight Transport

This thesis closes several research gaps and thereby makes theoretical as well as practical contributions to the domain of sustainable freight transport. The first research gap is the lack of a common definition of the construct acceptance in context of sustainable freight transport, which leads to an ambiguous use of this construct. Second, sustainable freight transport strategies have been previously studied in an isolated manner, whereas a holistic contemplation would lead to a more comprehensive strategy towards their introduction. Another research gap is the theoretical dearth that exists in green SCM. A topic which is absolutely under researched is the market failures that occur in the sustainable freight transport market. From a managerial perspective, there is a lack of research studies which incorporate a user-centric view to develop policy measures. This leads to the introduction of policy measures which do not meet the needs of transport users (i.e. logistics companies). This calls for a redesign of the common sticks-carrots-sermons typology to classify policy measures, since this typology fails to take users’ needs into account.

Resulting from the aforementioned research gaps that were tackled in the thesis, there are four theoretical and two practical contributions to the domain of sustainable freight transport. These contributions will be presented hereafter.

Theoretical contribution 1: Setting a concise definition of acceptance in context of sustainable freight transport

A variety of definitions of the construct acceptance have been developed in the recent literature comprising different suggestions of how to describe users’ acceptance of innovations or new technologies. This variety of definitions bears the risk of misinterpreting the results from different studies due to a missing common perception of the construct acceptance (Adell et al., 2018). For instance, some studies refer to acceptance if users perceive an innovation as useful, other studies require the actual use of innovations for acceptance to take place. To eliminate this confusion, this thesis developed a concise definition of acceptance in the context of sustainable freight transport. The definition developed in Subchapter 2.1 emphasizes the need for using (or at least being willing to use) sustainable freight transport strategies to realize their intended benefits (i.e. decarbonizing freight transport). For acceptance to take place it is not enough to appreciate the usefulness of a strategy, instead there must be a clear willingness to implement the strategy, otherwise the positive effects of sustainable transport will not materialize. The definition also focuses on the logistics companies’ perspective to account for the transport users’ subjective judgment of sustainable freight transport strategies and logistics companies’ expected gains from implementing these strategies. This fits with the overall user-oriented focus of this thesis, which brings transport users to the fore. To summarize, it is important to understand that acceptance is based on the transport users’ judgment of an innovation or a new technology such as sustainable transport strategies. It is therefore necessary that users recognize the benefits or gains of using the innovation.

Theoretical contribution 2: Holistic view of different approaches to reduce carbon footprint of freight transport

In this thesis, the topic of sustainable freight transport is viewed from a holistic perspective. The study allows for the in-depth comparison of three different, heterogeneous approaches to reduce the environmental impact of freight transport. These three approaches are (1) to avoid transport (2) to shift transport and (3) to improve transport (ASI framework). Existing studies only refer to one individual strategy limited to reducing the carbon footprint of transport, for example a specific transport concept such as combined transport only, or a specific technology such as a particular alternative powertrain only. There are hardly any studies which refer to different approaches and compare them. On the contrary, this study simultaneously examines avoid, shift and reduce strategies which allows the contextualization and juxtaposition of the characteristics and specificities of these three different approaches. Based on this holistic view, higher-level implications for the realization of the approaches can be derived and interrelationships can be identified. The holistic perspective allows the display of the transport sector as a whole system with various components that contribute to the overall goal, namely the decarbonization of freight transport. This thesis showed which overarching determinants affect the acceptance of sustainable freight transport in general. Based on that, some overarching policy measures were defined which promote the implementation of sustainable freight transport. Becoming acquainted with the higher-level determinants and the higher-level policy measures allows the gain of a better understanding for the basic direction in which the transport system has to move to become more sustainable. One individual strategy will not suffice to combat the environmental problems of the transport sector. The integrated and holistic view is therefore important to see the whole picture and form a comprehensive strategy for sustainable freight transport. This supports efficient policy making and promotes the decarbonization of freight transport.

Theoretical contribution 3: Developing a theoretical framework to explain the adoption of sustainable freight transport strategies

Recent literature underlines the theoretical dearth that exists in green SCM (Touboulic and Walker, 2015; Carter and Easton, 2011; Sarkis et al., 2011). Sustainable freight transport can be considered a subdomain of green SCM (Putz et al., 2018) and also lacks an appropriate theoretical underpinning. This thesis addresses the gap as it provides a comprehensive theoretical framework explaining the adoption of sustainable freight transport strategies (Subchapter 6.1). Well-established organizational theories are used to explain how logistics companies are encouraged to implement sustainable freight transport. Three dimensions of organizational existence are identified to substantiate why sustainable practices are introduced by LSPs. These three dimensions are organizational obligations, organizational capabilities and organizational functioning. Organizational obligations result from the logistics companies’ responsibility towards their stakeholders (stakeholder theory, agency theory, institutional theory). If stakeholders (such as customers) expect green operations, LSPs are encouraged for sustainable freight transport. Organizational capabilities determine the ability to introduce sustainable practices (resource-based view, knowledge-based view). If LSPs do not have the resources (physical resources or knowledge) to implement sustainable strategies, they will not be able to do so. Finally, organizational functioning, i.e. the companies’ operational principles, influences the implementation of sustainable strategies. LSPs try to minimize transaction costs (transaction cost economics), thus they will be eager to introduce green practices if they see the possibility to reduce transaction costs and thus maintain their organizational functioning.

The categorization of organizational dimensions (obligations, capabilities and functioning) is new and provides a useful theoretical framework for future research in the domain of sustainable freight transport. The categorization encompasses all relevant areas of organizational existence. The proposed theoretical framework can be used to explain the occurrence of sustainable practices in green SCM and logistics. This will deepen the understanding of logistics companies’ motives towards pro-environmental behavior and provides a starting point to define ways to encourage pro-environmental behavior.

Theoretical contribution 4: Explaining market failures which inhibit the implementation of sustainable freight transport

This is the first study that identifies different types of market failure to explain the reasons for the hesitant implementation of sustainable freight transport strategies. Hardly any studies refer to market failures as a rationale for the poor environmental performance of the logistics and transport sector. If at all, existing work only uses one individual type of market failure as an explanation. However, as shown in Subchapter 6.2, substantial market failures exist in the sustainable freight transport markets, and these market failures explain the rejection of sustainable strategies to a significant degree. The reason is that due to the existence of these market failures, logistics companies do not have an incentive to introduce sustainable freight transport. For example, logistics companies are not prevented from exploiting common resources (tragedy of the commons) and thus do not have an incentive to decarbonize their transport operations. Transport prices do not reflect environmental costs (existence of negative externalities), thus logistics companies are not encouraged to use sustainable transport. Additionally, many companies lack the required knowledge to introduce sustainable practices (imperfect information). As can be seen, the consideration of market failures allows insights into why the decarbonization of logistics is currently inhibited. Thereby, this thesis reveals important mechanisms and a new reasoning for the environmental problems of freight transport.

Practical contribution 1: User-centric view to promote the acceptance of sustainable freight transport

The users of sustainable freight transport are crucial players for the implementation of environmentally friendly transport systems. This thesis is one of the first studies which brings the users of sustainable freight transport to the fore as it analyzes the determinants of users’ acceptance and collects users’ suggestions for policy measures. Existing work strongly concentrates on the supply of sustainable freight transport and neglects the demand perspective. For example, studies on horizontal collaboration in a PI network predominantly deal with supply-related questions such as the design of PI containers to be used in the network or the development of decision support models to assist the operation of PI services (Plasch et al., 2021). Similarly, studies on horizontal collaboration in a synchromodal network have also focused tremendously on the supply side, for example by developing ICT systems and planning models for synchromodality (Pfoser et al., in press). The same problem persists within the literature on multimodal transport: a plethora of publications concentrates on multimodal transport planning, i.e. the design and optimization of multimodal transport chains (Agamez-Arias and Moyano-Fuentes, 2017). By contrast, there are only few studies which examine the demand for multimodal freight transport. Finally, also the literature on LNG as alternative truck fuel suffers from the same problem. A lot of technical studies exist covering supply-related topics such as the optimum fuel pressure of LNG vehicles, fuel tank systems, safety of storage facilities, and so on. Many publications also exist offering life-cycle analyses of GHG emissions. However, only a few studies refer to demand-related issues of LNG as an alternative fuel.

As illustrated above, the existing literature perfectly supports the supply of sustainable freight transport by developing knowledge about technology-related questions regarding the provision of sustainable freight transport (e.g. ICT systems or infrastructure such as terminals or refueling systems) or by providing planning models (e.g. for the transport service design). The supply-related studies are important to stimulate the provision of sustainable freight transport. However, it is equally important to understand the demand for sustainable freight transport, because without users’ demand, sustainable strategies will not be realized in practice. Users’ requirements and motives need to be considered in the process of advancing sustainable strategies to ensure their acceptance. Information on users’ requirements and motives is essential to adequately address the needs of those who finally implement sustainable freight transport. However, the abundance of supply-related studies do not provide information on users’ needs and demand. The present thesis contributes to this gap as it provides information on the determinants of users’ sustainable freight transport acceptance. The thesis also presents policy measures which are from users’ viewpoint appropriate to promote sustainable freight transport. These policy measures reflect the needs of those who use sustainable freight transport and therefore these measures have the potential to really initiate the decarbonization of freight transport.

Practical contribution 2: Extending the common environmental policy typology from the users’ perspective

The commonly used typology to classify environmental policy measures is the threefold sticks-carrots-sermons approach (Subchapter 2.2). This thesis reveals that from transport users’ perspective, the sticks-carrots-sermons typology falls short when applied to the field of sustainable freight transport. As illustrated in Subchapter 6.3, logistics companies do not favor the instrument of sticks (i.e. regulations and sanctions) to force sustainable practices. Instead, they suggest a new type of policy measure which is not covered by the previous sticks-carrots-sermons typology, namely means. The instrument of means involves the development of infrastructure and other framework conditions to support logistics companies with the introduction of sustainable freight transport. Means may constitute regulations (legal framework), but they are different from sticks as they do not force the target group to use the innovation. Means may also constitute economic instruments as infrastructure provision will be bound up with monetary investments. However, means differ from carrots as they do not make it cheaper or more expensive for the target group to use the innovation, but they make it possible to use the innovation.

Extending the existing threefold environmental policy typology by the category “means” is an important contribution for the domain of sustainable freight transport. Means (such as infrastructural development) have the potential to encourage logistics companies towards more sustainable behavior while at the same time maintaining the decision makers’ freedom to choose and not to oblige them to adopt a specific behavior. The intention of means is to encourage potential users by changing the built environment (Mattauch et al., 2016) or framework conditions. Means are a valuable complement to the original sticks, carrots and sermons instruments. The acceptance of means is expected to be high since it is a measure directly suggested by transport users. Policy makers should therefore consider means as a powerful instrument when seeking to promote sustainable freight transport.

7.4 Limitations, Further Research and Outlook

This thesis has several limitations that call for further research. First, the thesis claims to provide a holistic view of sustainable freight transport by juxtaposing different strategies that fall within different pillars of sustainable freight transport. However, within the scope of this thesis only three exemplary strategies were investigated, one for each pillar of the ASI model. Future research is needed to examine other strategies as well and ensure that they follow the same principles and lead to the same conclusions regarding the acceptance and policy measures for sustainable freight transport.

Second, the acceptance study is primarily based on qualitative research (interviews, focus groups). Qualitative research is limited to the results that emerge from the specific case companies under investigation. Although the case companies were selected deliberately to achieve a heterogeneous sample, it cannot be concluded without a doubt that the findings about sustainable freight transport acceptance are transferable to any logistics company in any industry. Further research could examine if the results also hold within other research settings, e.g. companies with different size, cultural context or organizational background.

Third, the thesis takes a user-centric perspective, which means that assessing the measures from the political perspective is not part of this study and should be covered by future research. The policy measures were developed within a qualitative and user-focused research process and reflect logistics companies’ needs towards sustainable freight transport. To account for the political perspective, it will be necessary to evaluate the viability and potential effects of the suggested measures. It is another limitation of this thesis that the suggested strategies are viewed in an isolated manner. In practice, single policy measures are hardly ever used on their own. Instead, it is more common (and more efficient) to use a mixture of these (Glasbergen, 1992; Taylor et al., 2012). Further research should therefore also focus on the question which combination of the suggested policy measures is the best to promote sustainable freight transport. Special attention must also be paid to the problem of rebound effects. A rebound effect offsets the positive effects of a policy measure (e.g. sustainable freight transport strategy) due to changed customer behavior (Matos and Silva, 2011). For example, due to the promotion of alternative fuels for road vehicles the use of road transport may increase, which offsets the efficiency gains of alternative fuels. Potential rebound effects that may occur along with the proposed strategies must therefore be identified and evaluated.

Subchapter 6.2 outlined several market failures that occur in the sustainable freight transport market. This outline is only an initial attempt to capture the market failures that impede sustainable freight transport. Further research should aim for an in-depth econometric analysis of the mechanisms causing these market failures. The characteristics of sustainable freight transport markets must be studied in more detail to understand which problems hinder the decarbonization of logistics. The basic assumption of welfare economics should be proved for the context of sustainable freight transport. This will help to gain further insights into how to remove the barriers which currently inhibit sustainable freight transport.

The empirical investigation in this thesis revealed that customer relationships are an extremely important lever to facilitate sustainable freight transport. Nearly all logistics companies stated that they would implement sustainable practices if they are requested to do so by their customers. They argue that in the end, it is the customer who has to pay for the transport services. If the customer is willing to pay for sustainable transport, then the logistics companies would implement sustainable practices. This finding is substantiated by two popular theories, stakeholder theory (Freeman, 1984) and agency theory (Eisenhardt, 1989). Both theories hypothesize that organizations follow the external pressure and needs from their stakeholders or agents, which are for example their customers. Since customer demand for sustainable freight transport is one of the most powerful motivators for LSPs to decarbonize their transport operations, future actions must involve customers, i.e. shippers (Figure 7.4). This call is consistent with Eng‐Larsson and Kohn (2012) who criticize that most research addresses the logistics’ perspective and neglects the shippers’ contextual viewpoints. Shippers must develop environmental awareness to drive their LSPs towards sustainable behavior. In general, environmental performance must become part of the freight transport and logistics procurement processes, which is currently not the case. The planning, tendering and contracting processes should consider environmental KPIs such as emission intensity. Currently, the transport price is the most decisive factor for transport customers in the logistics procurement process. In the future, the reduction in carbon foot print should be a relevant goal for shippers in their freight transport and logistics procurement.

Figure 7.4

Transport customers as relevant decisions makers

As a final remark it should be noted that the sustainable freight transport strategies under study in this thesis (ASI strategies) reinforce each other and create synergetic effects when implemented together. Figure 7.5 illustrates some of these synergetic effects that occur between the individual strategies. For example, horizontal collaboration allows for the bundling of transportation flows which in turn facilitates multimodal transport (as multimodal transport requires large cargo volumes to utilize the higher capacities of sustainable transport modes). Similarly, horizontal collaboration may encourage the use of alternative fuels as risk sharing and asset sharing reduce the uncertainty that is bound up with new technologies for logistics companies. Alternative fuels and multimodal transport also reinforce each other since alternative fuels make the first mile and last mile of multimodal operations greener and thereby make multimodal transport more competitive.

Figure 7.5

Synergetic effects of sustainable freight transport strategies

Due to the synergetic effects described above it is suggested that the ASI strategies should be implemented together and all of them should be promoted equally. This finding confirms the appropriateness of the holistic approach of this thesis, i.e. to regard all three ASI strategies simultaneously and compare the similarities concerning their determinants of acceptance and policy measures. Policy makers are advised to incorporate the synergetic effects and develop an integrated sustainable transport system where all three ASI pillars are implemented appropriately.