Question

GLOBAL MACROTRENDS AND THEIR IMPACT ON SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT

You have just been asked to develop a resource scarcity mitigation plan for your company. What information do you need to know about the resources your company uses? How will you use this information?

(2-3 paragraphs please) (5-6 sentences each)

Answer 1

Supply Chain Management : In simple terms, supply chain management is smooth management of logistics which involves a network of supplier, manufacturing, assembly, distribution etc. This chain also involves procurement of raw material, transforming these raw materials into intermediate goods and also to finished goods and ultimately making these goods available to customers.

Quoting the words of Prof Douglas M Lambert ," Supply chain can be defined as integration of business process from the end user through original supplier who provides products, services and information that adds value for the customers".

Components of Supply Chain:

• Procurement
• Processing
• Distribution

Resource Scarcity Mitigation plan:

Resource is a product or services provided and mitigation is the process of understanding the risks and loss involved. Thus, resource mitigation plan can be defined as the analysis involved while transporting goods from one place to another and preparing a plan inorder to overcome these risks. Scarcity arises when the resources are limited but the needs and wants towards that resource is more. For Example : Electricity, Petrol etc. When a scarcity of resource is seen we need to plan in advance how to overcome this and also the risk involved in this mitigation.

How to face the resource scarcity :

1) Identification: We need to identify the resources which are associated with scarcity.

2) Analyze impact : Then secondly, we need to analyze the impact of scarcity of a particular resource or say we also need to study whether these resource can be replaced with alternative. For example : We have been hearing use electricity wisely, we need to preserve electricity also for future generation but man has been able to find the alternative for electricity which is solar energy and this has been implemented in many countries so far.

3) Plan : Then we need to plan strategies of how to deal with scarcity of such resources.

4) Formulate : We need to formulate and design a model to face these scarcity so we can keep a close loop over this issue.

5) Control : Lastly, we also need to study how can we control over such risks and also overcoming the scarcity.

These are the things one must keep in mind while studying the resource scarcity.

The following are certain information we must know about the resources :

1) Customers preference and demand for the particular resource: When we study about a particular resource we need to closely monitor the demand and preference for that particular resource.

2) Transportation cost : The transportation cost of resources been transferred from one place to another.

3) Cost involved in production: Overall cost for production of a particular resource, the cost effiency and reduction or say optimisation of cost needs to be studied.