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Introduction To examine the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on mortality, we estimated excess all-cause mortality in 24 countries for 2020 and 2021, overall and stratified by sex and age.Methods Total, age-specific and sex-specific weekly all-cause mortality was collected for 2015–2021 and excess mortality for 2020 and 2021 was calculated by comparing weekly 2020 and 2021 age-standardised mortality rates against expected mortality, estimated based on historical data (2015–2019), accounting for seasonality, and long-term and short-term trends. Age-specific weekly excess mortality was similarly calculated using crude mortality rates. The association of country and pandemic-related variables with excess mortality was investigated using simple and multilevel regression models.Results Excess cumulative mortality for both 2020 and 2021 was found in Austria, Brazil, Belgium, Cyprus, England and Wales, Estonia, France, Georgia, Greece, Israel, Italy, Kazakhstan, Mauritius, Northern Ireland, Norway, Peru, Poland, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Ukraine, and the USA. Australia and Denmark experienced excess mortality only in 2021. Mauritius demonstrated a statistically significant decrease in all-cause mortality during both years. Weekly incidence of COVID-19 was significantly positively associated with excess mortality for both years, but the positive association was attenuated in 2021 as percentage of the population fully vaccinated increased. Stringency index of control measures was positively and negatively associated with excess mortality in 2020 and 2021, respectively.Conclusion This study provides evidence of substantial excess mortality in most countries investigated during the first 2 years of the pandemic and suggests that COVID-19 incidence, stringency of control measures and vaccination rates interacted in determining the magnitude of excess mortality.

Colombia has positioned itself as a significant actor in Hass avocado production, capitalizing on the rising global demand and its suitable climate for the crop. These conditions have led to considerable investments from farmers. In this business environment, this research presents a systematic simulation and methodological approach for the evaluation of crops focusing on the Hass avocado and its extension to small-scale producers in Colombia. The initial phase involved a comprehensive analysis of key variables in the Hass avocado production chain, assessing productivity and viability. Subsequently, a dynamic model was developed to explore four scenarios spanning 13 years. The first scenario evaluated the production chain’s current behavior, while the second scrutinized the impact of credit accessibility. The third scenario analyzed the associativity among producers’ effects, and the fourth assessed the impact of government support. The results underscore that the implementation of each strategy improves the economic returns. Integrating all three strategies is the most effective method. These scenarios serve as proactive tools for investors, equipping them valuable insights and enabling informed decisions. Moreover, the study advocates for the promotion of rural economic development through strategic agricultural interventions.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to present a spatial decision support system (SDSS) to be used by the local authorities of a city in the planning and response phase of a disaster. The SDSS focuses on the management of public spaces as a resource to increase a vulnerable population’s accessibility to essential goods and services. Using a web-based platform, the SDSS would support data-driven decisions, especially for cases such as the COVID-19 pandemic which requires special care in quarantine situations (which imply walking access instead of by other means of transport). Design/methodology/approach – This paper proposes a methodology to create a web-SDSS to manage public spaces in the planning and response phase of a disaster to increase the access to essential goods and services. Using a regular polygon grid, a city is partitioned into spatial units that aggregate spatial data from open and proprietary sources. The polygon grid is then used to compute accessibility, vulnerability and population density indicators using spatial analysis. Finally, a facility location problem is formulated and solved to provide decision-makers with an adaptive selection of public spaces given their indicators of choice. Findings – The design and implementation of the methodology resulted in a granular representation of the city of Lima, Peru, in terms of population density, accessibility and vulnerability. Using these indicators, the SDSS was deployed as a web application that allowed decision-makers to explore different solutions to a facility location model within their districts, as well as visualizing the indicators computed for the hexagons that covered the district’s area. By performing tests with different local authorities, improvements were suggested to support a more general set of decisions and the key indicators to use in the SDSS were determined. Originality/value – This paper, following the literature gap, is the first of its kind that presents an SDSS focused on increasing access to essential goods and services using public spaces and has had a successful response from local authorities with different backgrounds regarding the integration into their decision-making process.

Background: This study presents a comprehensive methodology for enhancing humanitarian logistics planning and management in natural disasters, focusing on earthquakes. Methods: The innovative approach combines a deterministic mathematical model with a simulation model to address the problem from multiple perspectives, aiming to improve efficiency and equity in post-disaster supply distribution. In the deterministic modeling phase, optimal locations for humanitarian distribution centers and points in Popayan, Colombia, were identified, enabling efficient resource allocation for affected families. Subsequently, the simulation model evaluated scenarios based on real earthquakes in Colombia and Latin America, providing a comprehensive view of the logistics system’s response capacity to different disaster conditions and magnitudes. Results: The results demonstrated that the proposed methodology significantly reduced supply delivery time, achieving a 30% improvement compared to traditional humanitarian logistics approaches. Moreover, it led to a more equitable coverage of affected communities, with a 25% increase in families served in previously underserved areas. Expert validation from the Disaster Risk Management Committee of the study area confirmed the methodology’s usefulness for informed and effective decision-making in real situations. Conclusions: This integrated approach of mathematical modeling and discrete event simulation offers valuable insights to address disaster management and support decision-making in humanitarian crises.

Abstract Background Understanding the impact of the burden of COVID-19 is key to successfully navigating the COVID-19 pandemic. As part of a larger investigation on COVID-19 mortality impact, this study aims to estimate the Potential Years of Life Lost (PYLL) in 17 countries and territories across the world (Australia, Brazil, Cape Verde, Colombia, Cyprus, France, Georgia, Israel, Kazakhstan, Peru, Norway, England & Wales, Scotland, Slovenia, Sweden, Ukraine, and the United States [USA]). Methods Age- and sex-specific COVID-19 death numbers from primary national sources were collected by an international research consortium. The study period was established based on the availability of data from the inception of the pandemic to the end of August 2020. The PYLL for each country were computed using 80 years as the maximum life expectancy. Results As of August 2020, 442,677 (range: 18–185,083) deaths attributed to COVID-19 were recorded in 17 countries which translated to 4,210,654 (range: 112–1,554,225) PYLL. The average PYLL per death was 8.7 years, with substantial variation ranging from 2.7 years in Australia to 19.3 PYLL in Ukraine. North and South American countries as well as England & Wales, Scotland and Sweden experienced the highest PYLL per 100,000 population; whereas Australia, Slovenia and Georgia experienced the lowest. Overall, males experienced higher PYLL rate and higher PYLL per death than females. In most countries, most of the PYLL were observed for people aged over 60 or 65 years, irrespective of sex. Yet, Brazil, Cape Verde, Colombia, Israel, Peru, Scotland, Ukraine, and the USA concentrated most PYLL in younger age groups. Conclusions Our results highlight the role of PYLL as a tool to understand the impact of COVID-19 on demographic groups within and across countries, guiding preventive measures to protect these groups under the ongoing pandemic. Continuous monitoring of PYLL is therefore needed to better understand the burden of COVID-19 in terms of premature mortality.

Purpose – This paper aims to design a vulnerability assessment model considering the multidimensional and systematic approach to disaster risk and vulnerability. This model serves to both risk mitigation and disaster preparedness phases of humanitarian logistics. Design/methodology/approach – A survey of 27,218 households in Pueblo Rico and Dosquebradas was conducted to obtain information about disaster risk for landslides, floods and collapses. We adopted a cross entropy-based approach for the measure of disaster vulnerability (Kullback–Leibler divergence), and a maximum-entropy estimation for the reconstruction of risk a priori categorization (logistic regression). The capabilities approach of Sen supported theoretically our multidimensional assessment of disaster vulnerability. Findings – Disaster vulnerability is shaped by economic, such as physical attributes of households, and health indicators, which are in specific morbidity indicators that seem to affect vulnerability outputs. Vulnerability is heterogeneous between communities/districts according to formal comparisons of Kullback–Leibler divergence. Nor social dimension, neither chronic illness indicators seem to shape vulnerability, at least for Pueblo Rico and Dosquebradas. Research limitations/implications – The results need a qualitative or case study validation at the community/district level. Practical implications – We discuss how risk mitigation policies and disaster preparedness strategies can be driven by empirical results. For example, the type of stock to preposition can vary according to the disaster or the kind of alternative policies that can be formulated on the basis of the strong relationship between morbidity and disaster risk. Originality/value – Entropy-based metrics are not widely used in humanitarian logistics literature, as well as empirical data-driven techniques.

In recent years, agriculture has become an essential activity in Colombia, despite the challenges faced by farmers due to low yields and insufficient resources to improve their main activities, such as irrigation systems, agricultural practices, and industrial machinery. This Hass avocado approach has been addressed in previous research considering system dynamics simulation to evaluate farmers’ behavior strategies and improve their competitiveness. However, these studies typically examine a single strategy effect and avoid multiple integrated strategies. Other studies focused on the complex interactions between different factors in the production chain and their feedback effects on farmers’ productivity and cash flow. For these reasons, this research provides a comprehensively dynamic model and evaluates long-term strategies and their effects on supporting and improving small farmers’ productivity and profitability. A system dynamics methodology was used to model complex systems processing Hass avocado farmer association data and explore their effects on competitiveness for long-term sustainable and profitable agriculture. This research proposes optimal scenarios for small farmers, including strategies such as low-interest credit access, logistics practices, and government technical support. The scenarios provide a proactive tool for decision makers and promote rural farmers’ development, aligning high-quality fresh product supply and demand.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to improve disaster management models, have an optimal distribution of assets, reduce human suffering in a crisis and find a good solution for warehouse locations, distribution points, inventory levels and costs, considering the uncertainty of a wide range of variables, to serve as a support model for decision making in real situations. Design/methodology/approach – A model is developed based on the recent models. It includes structured and non-structured data (historical knowledge) from a humanitarian perspective. This model considers the uncertainty in a landslide and flood area and it is applied in a representative Peruvian city. Findings – The proposed model can be used to determine humanitarian aid supply and its distribution with uncertainty, regarding the affected population and its resilience. This model presents a different point of view from the efficiency of the logistics perspective, to identify the level of trust between all the stakeholders (public, private and academic). The finding provides a new insight in disaster management to cover the gap between applied research and human behavior in crisis. Research limitations/implications – In this study the access of reliable information is limited. Practical implications – This paper provides an operation model with uncertainty in a humanitarian crisis and a decision-making tool with some recommendation for further public policies. Originality/value – This study presents a model for decision makers in a low-income zone and highlights the importance of preparedness in the humanitarian system. This paper expands the discussion of how the mathematical models and human behaviors interact with different perspectives in a humanitarian crisis.

Las aerolíneas alrededor del mundo se han visto afectadas por los desafíos de rentabilidad, participación de mercado y el comportamiento de la demanda, lo cual ha contribuido al desarrollo de la gestión de ingresos o Revenue Management. El modelo de gestión busca maximizar el nivel de ingreso en las empresas con la gestión de la demanda. La aplicación de este modelo en empresas de diversos rubros ha generado un incremento en sus ingresos anuales en orden del 4 a 5% favoreciendo oportunidades de negocio a través del desarrollo de nuevos mercados basados en la rentabilidad empresarial. La industria aeronáutica fue una de las pioneras en aplicar este modelo de gestión a nivel mundial. En esta oportunidad, el caso aplica el modelo en un mercado dinámico y con nuevas restricciones: mercado regional, vuelos cortos, tarifas desreguladas e impacto de las aerolíneas de bajo costo.

El rápido crecimiento de la población urbana ha generado el incremento de la demanda de bienes y servicios; asimismo, de las operaciones de distribución para satisfacer las necesidades propias de los clientes actuales. Ante esta situación, hay aspectos que representan un reto para la distribución de mercancías en las ciudades: la infraestructura en logística con su gestión de operaciones de carga y descarga, las entregas de mercancías, las regulaciones adecuadas, las vías, la señalización y los espacios públicos para el desenvolvimiento de las actividades humanas. Las bahías de carga y descarga son espacios de estacionamiento públicos o privados. Están destinados para realizar operaciones de abastecimiento y logística inversa de la cadena de suministros en los centros y puntos de distribución por vehículos de diversas características, de acuerdo con la operación de diferentes productos y servicios. Estas zonas facilitan la entrega de mercancías ya que reducen el impacto en la congestión del tráfico vehicular y favorecen la sostenibilidad ambiental de la ciudad. El presente artículo da a conocer las características de la infraestructura logística de la zona comercial de Chosica, ubicada en el distrito de San Juan de Lurigancho-Chosica en el departamento de Lima (Perú). También presenta la problemática de la ciudad, asociada a la ausencia de una política de carga y descarga de mercancías; del mismo modo, propone una integración de iniciativas para mejorar la distribución de mercancías en la zona. Para la caracterización de Chosica se utilizó la metodología del kilómetro cuadrado (km2), propuesta por el Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) con el inventario de comercios (generadores de carga), regulaciones y vías; y la observación y análisis de sus dinámicas y comportamiento en el frente más denso con sus disrupciones, entregas de mercancías y vehículos. De acuerdo con la caracterización de las condiciones de esta zona comercial y su generación de carga, se proponen políticas públicas y mejores prácticas para el desarrollo urbano y sostenibilidad de la ciudad. Los resultados muestran deficiencia en la infraestructura y en las instalaciones físicas para la operación de los flujos de la cadena de suministros; por otro lado, su influencia en el transporte, el inventario y el aprovisionamiento, desde la perspectiva de los operadores logísticos, se presentan con una pérdida en la eficiencia en el reparto de mercancías, reflejada en el precio final al consumidor. Las propuestas para la gestión de cargas y entregas de mercancías presentan el uso multimodal del espacio urbano y la adaptación de cada frente con el objetivo de mantener un equilibrio entre las necesidades de abastecimiento de los comercios y la demanda de los ciudadanos, la movilidad de la ciudad y la sostenibilidad de este ambiente creado por el ser humano.

Goals: This study focuses on assessing disaster risks in a typical inmegacity in Latin America. The baseline focuses on the logistics characteristics of the last mile, the vulnerability of buildings and the mobility of pedestrians. Design / Methodology / Approach: A risk assessment procedure is developed using logistic metrics through a methodology that captures the most relevant urban information within a square kilometer, and two complementary methods that provide support to obtain metrics associated with the occurrence of disasters. Results: The results show that the majority of blocks in the analyzed area have levels of precautionary risk due to their high level of store density, structure’s vulnerability, pedestrian movement and freight flow. Limitations of the research: The main limitations for the data collection were the insecurity, the level of informality and the chaos presented in the studied area. Practical implications: The main findings allow decision makers to know the most vulnerable areas of the place and, thus, propose recommendations for public policies based on urban knowledge. In addition, the proposed method can be taken as a reference to be applied to other zones of similar characteristics. Originality / Value: This research develops a methodology that evaluates the risks and mitigates the impact on a specific unstudied commercial area, combining three existing methodologies to correctly asses risk on certain zones. This work is an extension of the work of Huivin et al. (2020); the added value is that it provides deeper literature reviewing that help decision-makers and researchers to know the actual state of the art.

La gamitana es un pez originario de las cuencas de los ríos Amazonas y Orinoco, con una demanda creciente en el Perú, especialmente en los supermercados y restaurantes de comida típica de la selva, con una demanda aproximada de 600 kilos/semana, debido a la calidad del producto, por sus propiedades organolépticas homogéneas, su estricto control de calidad, sus certificaciones y auditoria del producto. Los objetivos de este estudio son redefinir la estrategia y rediseñar la cadena de suministro de Puñizas SAC, empresa familiar ubicada en Junín dedicada a la producción y distribución de la gamitana a los supermercados y restaurantes de comida de la selva en Lima, para añadir valor a los clientes enfocado en el flujo del producto (la gamitana).

This paper provides a framework to analyze the maturity of humanitarian logistics systems to face crisis situations related to recurrent events, and thus to identify the main areas of action and the community needs in terms of crisis logistics planning. First, the main notions of humanitarian logistics systems planning, and the theoretical contribution of maturity models are presented. Second, a maturity model for humanitarian logistics systems is proposed and the main categories of elements defining maturity extracted from literature. Then, the methodology to define the main elements of the maturity model via evidence is presented. This methodology combines a literature overview, a documentary analysis, and the development of three case studies, two located in Colombia and one in Peru. The main elements that characterize capability maturity model in humanitarian logistics systems facing recurrent crises are identified, from which the administration of donations, design of a distribution network, and the choice of suppliers are highlighted. The practical implications of the framework are proposed to allow its use to anticipate humanitarian logistics system for future crises. The framework allowed a first analysis guide and will be further extended.

Últimamente los productos conocidos como los “Superfoods” o “Superalimentos” tienen una gran demanda en los mercados internacionales. Perú tiene una gran variedad, dentro de los cuales se encuentran la maca, quinua, kiwicha y otros, que han captado interés en los mercados por ser productos naturales, orgánicos, funcionales y nutracéuticos. El Perú las promueve con el fin de impulsar y promover el biocomercio de los “Superfoods Perú”, que integrados con actividades de certificación orgánica, comercio justo y asociatividad se enrumban a ser piezas fundamentales para el desarrollo de las empresas formadas por comunidades, las que reciben beneficios económicos con mejora de calidad de vida de las familias y comunidades. PROMACA aplica este modelo donde implementa estas prácticas agrícolas orgánicas, impulsa la especialización, el comercio justo, la innovación y la asociatividad entre los miembros generando así un beneficio más para los que intervienen en la cadena, para los clientes y el ecosistema.

La presente investigación se realizó para los Productores Asociados de Chirimoya de Kalidad Óptima (PROACHIRKO); asociación agrícola creada en el año 2009 y constituida por cincuenta socios, ubicada en el distrito de Leoncio Prado, provincia de Huaura, Región Lima. Se dedica al cultivo y cosecha de la chirimoya en diferentes condiciones naturales. La investigación tiene como finalidad desarrollar un plan de acción basado en una propuesta de modelo de gestión empresarial asociativo que contemple la participación articulada de los sectores público, privado y académico, conjuntamente con una integración total basada en la confianza, sin embargo, deben mejorar su competitividad y ampliar su oferta en el mercado global. Mediante la investigación se analizará el entorno de PROACHIRKO, se identificarán sus características productivas, administrativas, aspectos asociativos, entre otros, para proponer el modelo que les permitirá garantizar su permanencia en el mercado local y capitalizar el entorno comercial favorable existente para las exportaciones.

La investigación se basa en un juego de negocios conocido como el juego de la cerveza, aplicada a una empresa metalmecánica. La diferencia principal de esta investigación está en la elección de los participantes (personal de la empresa en funciones similares). La metodología empleada en la obtención de datos y los resultados obtenidos en sus diversos escenarios: sin información, demanda conocida, cooperación y comunicación. Los resultados experimentales del moldeamiento del sistema de la producción y distribución de somier en una empresa de fabricación de muebles metálicos muestran en forma experimental el valor del acceso a la información y su efecto en la rentabilidad y eficacia de la empresa con la entrega de productos y servicios en el momento y lugar correcto, evitando costos innecesarios y el manejo inadecuado de los recursos.

Uno de los principales problemas que enfrentan las pequeñas unidades agrícolas rurales es establecer e implementar un modelo de gestión que aproveche sus potencialidades e impulse su desarrollo productivo. Con miras a suplir dicha carencia, se realizó una investigación de tipo transversal, exploratoria-descriptiva, no experimental y prospectiva entre los años 2008 y 2011. Su finalidad principal fue generar un modelo de desarrollo para una entidad autónoma e integrar tres sectores (público, privado y académico) de tal manera que garantizaran el aprovechamiento de los recursos de manera sostenible y competitiva, a partir del desarrollo de la vocación agropecuaria, el recurso hídrico, el parque tecnológico, las actividades no tradicionales (turismo y acuicultura) y la gestión pública