Humanitarian Logistics

Following the recent dramatic rise in both natural and man-made disasters, humanitarian logistics has received increasing interest from both logistics researchers and practitioners. Provided that logistics operations in the emergency response are effective and efficient, the impact of disasters on affected populations can be drastically reduced. Relief operations involve many different actors operating in complex relationships so as to effectively and efficiently meet the various challenges of preparing for and responding to disasters. In some very recent studies, inter-organizational interactions have emerged among these various actors as an interesting area of development. More research would seem to be required to move from inter-agency coordination to cross-sector cooperation among humanitarian organizations and companies, with a special focus on logistics companies. This book focuses on one specific open question: in logistics and supply chain management, what are the cross-learning opportunities for both the businesses and humanitarian organizations that cooperate in disaster relief through partnership agreements? In terms of the available academic literature and management practice, this subject is still a poorly explored research area, and so the present study is one of the first attempts to thoroughly investigate the issue.

Auteur

Alessandra Cozzolino is an assistant professor of management at the Department of Management at Sapienza University in Rome, where she teaches innovation management and organization science. She gained her PhD in management and finance in 2007 at the same university. She also is a lecturer in management at Luiss Guido Carli University in Rome. Her research focus is in the areas of humanitarian logistics and supply chain management, logistics services provider strategies, packaging innovation management, and sustainability within supply chains and operations. Her more recent publications have appeared in Journal of Humanitarian Logistics and Supply Chain Management and European Journal of Innovation Management. The author can be contacted at: alessandra.cozzolino@uniroma1.it.

Résumé
Humanitarian logistics has received increasing interest both from logistics academics and practitioners as a result of the dramatic increase in both natural and man-made disasters. The impact on affected populations can be all the more limited as much as the logistics operations in response to emergencies are effective and efficient. Collaboration with various relevant actors involving in the emergency resolution can help to reduce costs, increase speed, and improve the leanness/agility level in the humanitarian supply chain, and viceversa, poor coordination among them is cited as an explanation for performance gaps. As disasters become increasingly complex better collaboration not only with government agencies, military units, humanitarian organizations, but also through partnerships with private business becomes more and more important. However, such partnerships are not easy as organizations in the two sectors are extremely different. The main aim of this study is exploring more in depth the partnership between profit and non-profit in emergency relief operations, with a specific attention to the cross-learning potential for both the logistics service provider (profit) and the humanitarian organization (non-profit).

Contenu
Introduction.- Humanitarian Logistics and Supply Chain Management.- Humanitarian Supply Chain Relationships: Working Together to Meet the Challenge of Preparing for and Responding to Disasters.- Emblematic Example of Strategic Cross-Sector Partnership: Logistics Emergency Teams.