Reducing Carbon Footprint For A Greener Supply Chain Is Easily Achievable

he topic of greening supply chains has been a hotsystem, all necessary process documentation is
topic for several years, many companies involved inalways available to any staff member who requires
shipping and freight forwarding in today’saccess to the files. Electronic documentation also
dynamic global economy are overlooking manyvastly reduces the amount of unnecessary
obvious and cost-efficient ways they can reduce thepaperwork throughout the supply chain process.
industry’s carbon footprint.• Create a Centralized Repository for
A recent Eye for Transport study was conductedDocumentation. Regardless of your documentation
that surveyed more than 250 supply chain executivesprocess, establishing an automated, centralized
to determine their views on greening. Nine percentdatabase repository for all job, client, sales and staff
identified green issues as their No.1 priority over therelated documents in an electronic format will vastly
next three years, while nearly 70% said green issuesincrease efficiency and productivity, while facilitating
would become more important to their processesthe push toward a paperless office environment. The
over that time. The survey found greening to bestorage and centralization of documents greatly
“fundamentally a co-operative process,” withsimplifies the ability of staff to access the central
most of the successful programs based ondatabase electronically to update, send and store
“changing relationships with suppliers, partners anddocuments such as bills of lading, commercial invoices,
logistics providers.” Indeed, 28% of respondentspacking lists and other pertinent data as it moves
said they currently partner, or plan to partner, withthrough the supply chain.
their logistics partners to help green their processes.• Integrate Your Route Optimization and
With the new technologies available to logisticsConsolidation Process. The key to creating a greener
providers today, there are few disciplines that lendsupply chain lies in the integration of all documentation
themselves to the “greening of thebetween you and your customers via an integrated
environment” as well as do transportation andelectronic data management system that permits
logistics. Shipping and distribution services account forautomatic access to files as they move through the
three-fourths of a company's carbon footprint, thesupply chain. These documents can be automatically
measurement of the impact human activities have onattached with email invoices, scanned directly into
the environment as determined by the amount offiles, automatically allocated by type and reference
carbon dioxide produced by greenhouse gasvia barcode dividers and accessed by all trading
emissions. There is no reason the logistics industrypartners via your web site. The ediEnterprise system
can’t do more to solve this problem.effectively supports a forwarder’s route
CargoWise edi has been facilitating customers’optimization and consolidation processes, which
green initiatives for years with its ediEnterprisemeans less carbon dioxide is generated for a lower
integrated software system that provides acarbon footprint.
paperless approach to forwarders’ supply• Create an Automated Storage and Archive
chain operations, reducing the paper trail andSystem. It is important to create a central storage
facilitating the push to a paper free office. Whenand archive system for electronic documents that
discussing carbon-neutral initiatives companies cancan accessed by your staff and customers at any
implement to help green supply chains, they shouldtime for reference. Maintaining files in an automated
be more than just talking about reducing fuelarchive vastly reduces the amount of paperwork
emissions.involved in supply chain management process over a
Many of the “cradle-to-grave” initiativeslong period of time, reduces the need for filing
companies can institute for a greener environmentcabinets and frees up important floor space. A
simply involve eliminating waste while improvingdocumentation module such as that found in
productivity. In the air cargo industry alone, we couldCargoWise ediEnterprise will enable you to document
fill about 40 Boeing 747 freightliners each year withyour electronic files, as well as store them for future
paper wasted on documentation, not to mention theaccess.
labor hours necessary to produce and handle it all.• Improve ROI by Greening Supply Chain Activities.
Yet, we continue to see companies that are notGreening your supply chain can be accomplished with
taking advantage of the available automation thata minimum of capital investment and can improve the
would save both the environment and logistics costs.ROI of your customers, vendors and company. New
The paperless office has not arrived; but it is possible.e-documentation technology makes your forwarding
CargoWise suggests five critical areas that wouldoperation more efficient in many ways, creating
enable companies to automate documentation tofewer costs with a greater impact on the greening
“green the global supply chain” while creatingof the supply chain.
greater efficiencies and reducing overall operationalAutomating a robust integrated documentation and
costs.storage process with the new technologies available
• Automate Documentation to Reduce Your Paperjust makes sense if we are to create a more
Trail. Too many companies still use paperpaperless environment and reduce the amount of
documentation, which not only creates waste, butgreenhouse gases associated with global supply chain
places limitations on the work process by placing it inprocess. The time to implement these changes in
the hands of whichever employee holds the paperyour operating procedures is now.
copies, by switching to a quick and easy electronic