Manufacturing industry is known as being one of the cores driving force of economy in most countries; due to current environment awareness on environmental pollution, depleting natural resources, waste and climate change it is essential for manufacturing industry to adopt changes in its production system. In other words increasing pressures on manufacturing firms has compelled manufacturers to enhance their environmental performance Choudhary, Nayak, Dora, Mishra and Ghadge (2019) and Jazairy and Von Haartman (2020). In order to respond to environmental pressures or sustainability (Toke & Kalpande 2017) manufacturers today need to be well equipped to handle a variety of pressures to improve the effectiveness of their product while simultaneously looking for ways to cut costs. For authors such as Al-Sheyadi Muyldermans and Kauppi (2019) and Micheli, Cagno, Mustillo and Trianni (2020) GSCM practices has been recognised as an imperative business approach to enhance eco-sustainability and to achieve firm profit as well as market share objectives by decreasing environmental risks and impact. Whereas for Qorri, Mujkić, Gashi and Kraslawski (2018) the conceptualisations of GSCM practices can be seen in extant literature and there is evidence of mixed results relating GSCM practices to firm performance. This confusion leads to a very significant question for this study: What green practices of GSCM should supply chain professionals take into consideration? In the words of Abdel-Baset, Chang and Gamal (2017); Rajeev, Pati, Padhi and Govindan (2017) there is a shortage of studies on green supply chain management practices and performances. This study is envisioned to address this gap and to analyse activities that can contribute to eco-sustainability and green performance in the perspective of GSCM. Accordingly, an extensive literature review of GSCM and green performance were carried out through the examination of six relevant elements which were identified. The aim of this paper is to present a qualitative method through a content analysis approach that allows researchers and practitioners such as supply chain professionals in the manufacturing industry what practices should be considered.

Keywords: Green supply chain, green performance, manufacturing, Gauteng