Under the vision of national carbon peak and carbon neutralization, by taking seriously consumed fruit and vegetable products in China as the research object and carbon tax policy as a consideration, the cold chain coordination and optimization problem of fruit and vegetable products was studied. Aiming at the issues of unreasonable supply chain pricing and high carbon emissions, and considering the loss of fruit and vegetable products, a method was proposed to coordinate the cold chain of fruit and vegetable products.

The centralized decision-making model and decentralized decision-making Stackelberg game model of two-stage cold chain emission reduction were established, which consisted of suppliers and retailers. Suppliers, as the leading enterprise of the cold chain system, and retailers as followers, obtained the dynamic equilibrium strategy under centralized decision-making and decentralized decision-making. In view of the dual marginal effects under decentralized decision-making, the cost-sharing contract model was used for coordination, and the sensitivity analysis of the basic quantity loss rate and the carbon tax rate was carried out.

It was found that the cold chain system has low profits and high carbon emissions under decentralized decision-making. Under contract coordination, the carbon emissions of the cold chain system of fruit and vegetable products have been improved, the prices of fruit and vegetable products have decreased, the market demand has increased, and the profits of suppliers, retailers and the cold chain system have increased compared with that before coordination. After contract coordination, the carbon emission reduction level of the cold chain of fruit and vegetable products is positively correlated with the government carbon tax rate, and negatively correlated with the basic quantity loss. The total profits of the cold chain system and the profits of suppliers and retailers are negatively correlated with the carbon tax rate and the basic quantity loss rate. The optimal selling price of the product first increases and then decreases with the increase of carbon tax rate, and it decreases with the increase of basic quantity loss rate. The optimal order quantity of products first increases and then decreases with the increase of carbon tax rate, and it decreases with the increase of basic quantity loss rate.

It is not that the higher the carbon tax rate, the better. An appropriate carbon tax rate is conducive to promoting cold chain enterprises to invest in carbon emission reduction and reduce carbon emissions, which is beneficial to the realization of the “double carbon” goal. However, the carbon emission reduction investment does not always increase with the increase of the carbon tax rate, so the government should take comprehensive consideration to formulate appropriate carbon tax rates to ensure both low carbon emissions of products and the willingness of enterprises to participate. Enterprises should improve their logistics service capabilities to reduce the loss of fruits and vegetables in the production and transportation process and reduce resource waste.