EFFECT OF INFORMATION SHARING PRACTICES ON OPERATIONAL PERFOR-MANCE OF FOOD PROCESSING FIRMS IN NAIROBI COUNTY, KENYA

Abstract

The information sharing practices account to about fifty percent of the profitability and better performance of any firm (KAM 2023). The food processing subsector performance has been declining thus its contribution to the Gross Domestic Product has reduced to 10% thus leading to operation inefficiency. Information sharing can significantly enhance the contribution of food processing firms to a country's GDP by improving efficien-cy, innovation, market access, and value addition. The objective of the study was to probe the effect of infor-mation sharing practices on performance of food processing firms in Nairobi County. The study was premised on the grey system theory. Descriptive research design was employed. A population of 172 food processing firms and a sample size of 120 firms was determined. Stratified and simple random sampling were used to se-lect specific firms while data were collected using structured questionnaires. Descriptive statistics aided in describing the primary characteristics of the data. Regression analysis was used to establish the relationship between information sharing practices and operational performance of food processing firms with the aid of SPSS version 28. T-statistics were used to gauge the significance of individual objectives at 5% confidence level while F-statistic was used to establish the overall significance of the model. The study established that information sharing practices positively affected operational performance, (regression coefficient 0.247, p = 0.029). The study concludes that enhanced information sharing substantially improves the performance of food processing firms. It recommends increased investment in platforms such as Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) to facilitate timely, accurate, and reliable information flow, streamline supply chain coordination, and improve overall efficiency and cost-effectiveness. Additionally, the study contributes to academic literature by offering theoretical and empirical insights into supply chain management practices, thereby serving as a resource for future research.