Students Corner - 217

The experts in logistics talk of 7 Rs of logistics; they are Right Product, Right Quantity, Right Condition, Right place, Right time, Right Customer and Right Cost. 

Actually, all the Rs are inter-related; one leads to the other if we consider the end of logistics, namely, movement of a product from the place of origin to the place of consumption; that is, from the manufacturer to the consumer who is the customer. That is, logistics is essentially a process with many sub-processes in it, a process which involves many processes at many levels of performance of specific functions. Buying  the raw materials, buying them in right quality and quantity required , manufacturing a product using those raw materials, marketing the finished products through marketing personnel,  storing finished products in warehouses, choosing right mode of transport for the movement of the product—it goes on and on like that; all these processes, tasks grouped together become so to say logistics.

There is no commercial profitable engagement without a good sense of logistics. In other words, logistics and business engagement are inseparable as much as capital and a business enterprise. And logistics and supply chain are again twins that cannot exist independent of one another.

Only in about five decades or so, logistics as a system has been formulated; about hundred years ago, nobody gave a thought to this thing called logistics though all the functions of logistics were carried out. The growth of business implies newer challenges and efforts to find solutions for them ; that is, from being simple low-volume business to massive business corporate, the society demanded growth of business activities and with rising complexity, it became a necessity to formulate a system to meet the growing complexity of business concerns and logistics was born ; of course, marketing management took the precedence and the development of marketing management could not but find another equally important branch of business concern ,  logistics came to be. Today, all are concerned with logistics which has become all inclusive comprehensive subject of the day.

Practical usefulness of logistics is beyond any doubt and it seems to form basis for some massive programs like national and international economies and their development; in fact, the logistics is being used as an infallible tool to assess the development of a country, economically and socially.

 A massive ship with thousands of containers loaded with cargo at a worth of billions of dollars passing through endless ports and a poor postman who is 50+ in a torn uniform with a bag slung across his shoulders carrying small parcels and even post-cards—these two are objects of logistics performing relevant social useful functions.  That is, logistics is universal and it is bound to grow and expand continually.