SIGNIFICANCE OF OPERATIONS-RESEARCH FOR HIERARCHICAL PRODUCTION PLANNING

Hierarchical production planning is presented as an issue for the integration of operations research and production planning. The investigation comprises two levels: in a first step, the main elements of hierarchical production planning, decomposition, hierarchy, aggregation, and coordination, as well as fields of its practical application are presented systematically. Possible uses of methods of operations research on different hierarchical planning levels are discussed. In a second step, a theoretical foundation of hierarchical production planning in the fields of aggregation, decomposition, and coordinations is derived from the corresponding areas of operations research.