Question

1. Why are transportation problems given this name?

2. What is an identifying feature of transportation problems?

3. How does the form of a fixed-requirement constraint differ from that of a resource constraint?

Answer 1

1  The transportation problem is a distribution-type problem, the main goal of which is to decide how to transfer goods from various sending locations (also known as origins) to various receiving locations (also known as destinations) with minimal costs or maximum profit. Sice these are related to transporting goods from origin to destination while minimizing the cost, this is known as TRANSPORTATION PROBLEM.

2.

Characteristics of Transportation Problems

• The Requirements Assumption: – Each source has a fixed supply of units, where this entire supply must be distributed to the destinations

– Each destination has a fixed demand for units, where this entire demand must be received from the sources

• The FeasibleSolutions Property:– A transportation problem will have feasible solutions if and only if the sum of its supplies equals the sum of its demands.

• The Cost Assumption:– The cost of distributing units from any particular source to any particular destination is directly proportional to the number of units distributed.– This cost is just the unit cost of distribution times the number of units distributed

3. A fixed requirement constraint - a functional constraint with an = sign. The left hand side represents the amount provided of some type of quantity and the right hand side represents the required amount for that quantity.

Resource constraint - A functional constraint with a <= sign. The left hand side represents the amount of some resource that is used by the activities under consideration, and the right hand side represents the amount available of that resources