Development of a framework for sustainable product design

Abstract

In line with the significant shift of the global manufacturing practice towards a more sustainable direction, a myriad of frameworks and design tools were developed to provide support to the designers during the product design process. The main goals of the frameworks and tools, ideally, are to incorporate beneficial attributes into a product based on the interests of three pillars of sustainability, namely social, economy and environment. Nevertheless, the literatures studied revealed that most of the frameworks and tools do not cover the sustainability dimensions holistically and simultaneously as an integral part of the design strategy. Besides that, it was found that the product design practices in manufacturing barely integrate the principles and values of Islam commercially, despite Islam being a holistic religion and is applicable in any area of life. The primary goal of this study is to develop a design tool that could work effectively in the design process to consider a more holistic horizon of sustainability based on an Islamic perspective. As a foundation, a framework of Sustainable Product Design was developed by integrating the elementary elements derived from Maqasid Shari’ah and Islamic values pertaining to the sustainability concept and product design into the conventional framework. Subsequently, based on the integrated framework, the ideal product attributes were derived which represent the product's quality dimensions from Islamic perspective. Finally, a new design tool named the ENRICH Tool was successfully developed, comprising six processes, namely Eliminate, Nourish, Readapt, Infuse, Create and Harmonise. The tool works as a cyclical process and can be easily integrated into the typical design process. The design tool was applied in three case studies of design projects, involving different products namely a domestic food waste recycler, a walking aid (simulation approach) and a chapter in a Physics textbook (non-technical product). Based on the Quality Index (QI) comparisons, the results for Case Studies One and Two showed an improvement in designs, respectively, by around 35% (compared to the concept design) and 11% (compared to the final design of DFSS). In Case Study Three, 80% of the 24 questionnaires on the perceptions of the end users on the developed integrated Physics chapter recorded high mean scores of 4.0 and above. The results, therefore, reflect the viability of the ENRICH Tool in the case studies and prove its effectiveness in improving the quality, values and sustainability attributes of the products. The integrated Sustainable Product Design framework and the ENRICH Tool, which were developed based on the Islamic perspective, could offer alternatives in the design strategy for sustainable product development. The ENRICH Tool could support the industrial product designers effectively in developing a more sustainable product. As a result, it would benefit stakeholders which include the consumers, manufacturing players, government agencies, tax payers as well as the environment, either directly or indirectly. In addition, this attempt could inspire academics and researchers to expand the study on the incorporation of Islamic approach in manufacturing practices particularly in industrial product design. Nevertheless, this endeavour is still at the infancy stage, therefore, further works need to be carried out to improve the developed integrated framework and design tool.