# Artificial Intelligence In Reverse Supply Chain Management The State Of The Art

Bo Xing1*, Wen-Jing Gao1, Kimberly Battle1, and Tshilidzi Marwala1 1Faculty of Engineering and the Built Environment University of Johannesburg Johannesburg, South Africa bxing2009@gmail.com Abstract**—Product take-back legislation forces manufacturers**
to bear the costs of collection and disposal of products that have reached the end of their useful lives. In order to reduce these costs, manufacturers can consider reuse, remanufacturing and/or recycling of components as an alternative to disposal. The implementation of such alternatives usually requires an appropriate reverse supply chain management. With the concepts of reverse supply chain are gaining popularity in practice, the use of artificial intelligence approaches in these areas is also becoming popular. As a result, the purpose of this paper is to give an overview of the recent publications concerning the application of artificial intelligence techniques to reverse supply chain with emphasis on certain types of product returns. 

Keywords-artificial intelligence; reverse supply chain management; product returns; end-of-use; end-of-life; 

## I. Introduction

Enterprises around the world are employing reverse supply chain (RSC) practices to overcome the regulations and generate profit making opportunities. As a result of the rapid progress in technology, the product life cycles are shrinking faster than ever. In the face of global competition, heightened environmental regulations and a wealth of additional profits and improved corporate image opportunities, performing the RSC operations at a world class level is becoming essential. 

In the literature, different techniques have been employed to solve problems occurring in various dynamic segments of reverse supply chain management (RSCM). Our review is dedicated to the applications of common artificial intelligence (AI) techniques in this context, exploring the current research trends and identifying opportunities for further investigation. The main issues going to be addressed in this article include: what are the main problems within RSCM that have been investigated using AI techniques? 

What kinds of AI techniques have been employed? 

In answer to these questions, we organize our research as follows: first Section II delivers a brief introduction about Fulufhelo V. Nelwamondo1,2 2Modeling and Digital Science Unit Council for Scientific & Industrial Research (CSIR)
Pretoria, South Africa RSC; next the survey method employed in this research is outlined in Section III; then the results of this survey are detailed in Section IV; finally the discussions and conclusions are given in Section V. 

## Ii. Why Reverse Supply Chain

Reverse supply chains are heralded by environmentalists as key elements of sustainable production. In a forward supply chain, the customer is typically the end of the process. 

However in changing the end-point of a company's supply chain from the consumer to the product's end-of-life or to possibly even the start of a new production cycle, RSCs present opportunity to extend the use of products, conserve resources, prevent waste, and create secondary markets and jobs in remanufacturing and recycling. Intuitively RSCs are more complicated since return flows may include products, subassemblies and/or materials and may enter the forward supply chain in several return points. 

Generally the activities in a RSC vary in complexity and managerial importance from scenario to scenario. The situation is normally complicated by different types of returns [1]: 
- Product life cycle returns: These returns are linked to the sales process. The reasons for the returns include problems with products under warranty, damage during transport or product recalls; 
- Re-Usable components: These returns are related to consumption, use or distribution of the main product; 
- End-of-use returns: These are used products or components that have been returned after customer's usage. These used products are normally traded on an aftermarket or being remanufactured; 
- End-of-life returns: These are returns that are taken back from the market to avoid environmental or commercial damage. In the context of take-back 