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Top1. Introduction
Food safety has become a sensitive issue, for the developing countries like India, upsurging the food demand by 60-90 percent (Kumar et al, 2019, Schmitz et al., 2017). This rise in demand for food is enhanced by wastage done by many industries in which the dairy industry is one. The main reasons for the waste of food are inefficient storage facilities, indecorous packaging, losses due to inappropriate transportation management, poor inventory management (Bravi et al., 2019; Bharucha, 2018; Sheahan et al, 2017). Consequently, dairy supply chains are more concerned with controlling the milk quality and supply fluctuations which are unique to this sector. A time-efficient supply chain known as the cold chain is required for perishable items like milk and its products. This perishability factor can affect the dairy supply chain. Addressing the various proficiencies in the perishable food supply chain led to a reduction in the food loss from origination to the consumption end along with providing majestic financial, economic, and environmental profits (Balaji et al, 2016; Hodges et al., 2011). Supply chain management has been seen as a source of gaining a competitive advantage in the business world. Increased competition among the dairy companies resulting from the globalization of supply, processing, and logistics network, high demand of customer service, quality of dairy products, and its competitive pricing has designated the importance of supply chain management in recent years. Success pre-requisite of a dairy industry depends on ICT enable efficient supply chain management. Wastage and poor handling of milk and milk products in the Indian supply chain is the main issue to look after at which occurs due to multiple points involved in the handling of the same. The lack of cold chain or storage facilities and inappropriate transportation facilities techniques has led to inefficiencies in handling milk and its products. There is a compelling case for appropriate infrastructure for storage and transportation, such as temperature-controlled warehouses and vans. Therefore, by adopting and practicing the effective supply chain management practices there will be a tremendous reduction in the loss of milk and its products and also significantly benefits all the dairy supply chain members which include farmers, customers, companies, and stakeholders by the means of increased return on assets to the firm and decrease in price. Numerous studies depict that milk and milk products are easily damaged if the suitable environmental factor is lacking such as right temperature, storing facilities, whilst mandatory to be preserved and controlled on a real-time basis (Zambrano et al., 2019; Schanes et al., 2018). Therefore, to maintain the quality and enhance the shelf life of dairy products, proper warehousing, transportation, cold chain facilities are required which are only possible through implementing IT-enabled supply chain management systems at the workplace. ICT will help in monitoring various tasks involve in SCM efficiently and effectively (Daneshvar et al, 2019; Han et al., 2017). Furthermore, the implementation of an IT-enabled supply chain enhances the capability by getting the real-time response and performance advancement (Wen et al., 2018; Thoni et al, 2017; Han et al., 2017).