bigpicture
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Columnists:
Clifford F. Lynch
Don Jacobson
Shelly Safian
Kenneth B. Ackerman
Art Van Bodegraven
Barry Brandman
The logistics of feeding the hungry
Gary Master
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Group Editorial Director
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Jim Indelicato
Group Publisher
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I’M NOT SURE WHAT BUSINESS PROFESSIONALS CAN LEARN FROM
operations like those of the World Food Programme, but I’m convinced
that we somehow serve the industry by telling that story and others like it.
I hope you agree.
This month’s Thought Leader interview features a conversation with
Stephen Cahill, head of contracting for ocean services for the World Food
Programme. The WFP, an arm of the United Nations, ships more than 4
million tons of food annually to feed more than 100 million people around
the globe. Half of that food moves by ocean vessels.
We’ve written from time to time about the extraordinary efforts of carriers and shippers to move needed relief supplies and foodstuffs to disas-ter-stricken regions—places like Haiti or New Orleans.
What the World Food Programme does is much
more akin to what distribution managers do every day.
That is, to move its freight—food for the poor—where
it’s needed, when it’s needed in the most efficient way
possible, every day. The agency has adopted its own
version of near-sourcing, buying food as close to where
it’s needed as possible. Its annual shipping budget of
$250 million makes it a major international shipper. It
has adopted modern visibility tools to help it manage
its global supply chain.
But in many ways, its mission is unlike most of those
faced by business logistics professionals. It is shipping
food to some of the most remote parts of the world,
areas notable for their poor infrastructure, political
instability, and weak or non-existent security. It has to deal with piracy and
political unrest. For example, the agency recently had to scramble to find
alternative routes to Chad when its normal route through Libya became
impassable after the rebellion broke out there.
And sadly, its work will not end any time soon. Cahill told DCV Senior
Editor Mark Solomon that world food prices have spiked sharply since the
last peak in 2008, which means WFP can only buy half the amount of wheat
for the same money it could one year ago. At the same time, it has seen the
number of underfed people worldwide push over the 1 billion mark. Even
so, he speaks with some optimism about emerging technological tools that
promise to make operations like his more effective and efficient.
Of course, none of us can predict what other events, man-made or natural, will disrupt that supply chain (or others) in the days, weeks, and years
to come. Supply chain volatility is a real concern for every logistics manager. But missions like those of the WFP seem especially vulnerable and the
consequences especially great.
