Supplier selection is a very important activity in supply chain management, and it directly influences the performance of organizations, product quality, and other factors related to the production process. Supplier selection has been addressed as a multicriteria decision problem that considers that the requirements of the buyers should focus on criteria used to evaluate the supplier options available. Various multicriteria decision methods or a combination of them have been proposed to tackle this problem. Three articles were identified during a literature review on this topic. The most recent article cited studies from 2000 to 2008. This paper also includes the review of other 120 articles that were retrieved from the literature search using different national and international data bases. Based on the articles reviewed, the most commonly used multicriteria decision methods, context of applications, study sources, among other relevant information. The results show that methods capable of dealing with uncertainty and qualitative information are the most common. Also, it seems that there is a gap between real world needs and the proposed theoretical models. Finally, the present study identifies areas that need further research.
Multicriteria decision methods (MCDM); Supplier selection; Supply chain management
