“However, it is encouraging to see multinational companies like Kuehne + Nagel implementing measurement of carbon footprint,†said Wines, whose company provides Enterprise-level, comprehensive functional testing products and services for ERP, CRM and custom software application environments.
Environmental and green practices have to be part of the overall business processes if such initiatives are to succeed, and more firms have to be willing to participate in best practices sustainable programmes, Wines said.
Organisations should look at including environmentally practices in the company’s long term business plans, but instead, relatively few do it, he said adding that they should look at the overall matrix and also put into placee-commerce activities.
Need for sustainability
Turloch Mooney, editor of Supply Chain Asia Magazine who was acting as moderator of the Green Logistics Workshop, said green logistics needs to be effective and sustainable, and it should also influence business products and services as well as be attractive to consumers.
He said that through applying green logistics, a company should derive revenue on its own through the materials used and ethics implemented, to create value for the company.
“Green logistics can offer value creation for incoming brands and it can also attract better people to your organisation. In terms of supply chain for a specific industry, it is also important to track the changes,†he said. He cited Unilever as an example of a company which had put in sustainable efforts to bring about product innovations in reducing waste and commitment to product compliance.
Although more firms were willing to initiate sustainability programmes, most of them experienced various degrees of difficulties in implementing them, Wines said. But companies like Walmart, which had implemented such programmes, were getting great rewards from such activities, he added.
Cost component
According to Paul Lim, regional business development manager at TNT based in Singapore, cost is an important component when looking at equipment and investments related to green logistics. “In life, it takes a lot of time to go green, and it is also easier said than done,†he noted, adding that being environmentally friendly, green initiatives would take root on a bigger and more effective scale. Global Supply Chain Group managing director, Vivek Sood, said: “We saved clients lots of money in 2005 with supply chain transformation, particularly global chemicals companies which have been causing pollution for hundreds of years.
“Now, we only want them to solve some of the problems. Analysis shows that by greening, firms can save money. You save money by going green but you have to take an end-to-end view and don’t do green washing,†he said.
Greenwashing, according to Source- Watch’s definition, is the unjustified appropriation of environmental virtue by a company, an industry, a government, a politician or even a non-government organisation to create a pro-environmental image, sell a product or a policy, or to try and rehabilitate their standing with the public and decision makers after being embroiled in controversy.
Green reduces costs
Mooney said usually green logistics was seen as a cost issue, but even if greening costs a significant amount, companies could start with simple moves such as green packaging. He cited the example of a washing machine where most of the packaging is wasted. “So someone came up with modular packaging for the machine which the industry can use and re-use for up to 20 times, making the costs go down by 80 per cent.â€Â
Another example is BlackBerry manufacturer Research In Motion which now only sends damaged parts for repair or replacement instead of the whole phone, thus modifying its original process and cutting down the cost in a move which is seen as going green.