Improve the cost management level of cold chain logistics and help logistics enterprises obtain economic profits

Forwarded from Jiuzhou Logistics Network 2022-12-26
preface
The cost management of cold chain logistics can not only enhance the economic benefits of related enterprises, but also promote the healthy development of the cold chain logistics industry. However, the current cost management of cold chain logistics in China still has some problems, such as backward hardware facilities of cold chain logistics, serious waste of cold chain logistics resources, inadequate cold chain logistics distribution services, and lack of cold chain logistics cost management talents, which lead to very general effect of cost management. In order to change this situation, cold chain logistics enterprises need to strengthen the construction of cold chain transportation hardware facilities, improve the utilization rate of cold chain logistics resources, improve the service quality of cold chain logistics, and strengthen the training of cold chain logistics cost management personnel. Only in this way can the level of cold chain logistics cost management be improved and logistics enterprises obtain greater economic profits.
1、 Analysis on the Problems of Cost Management of Cold Chain Logistics
（1） Backward hardware facilities of cold chain logistics
Cold chain logistics has put forward high requirements for hardware facilities, but at present, the construction of hardware facilities of cold chain logistics in China is not optimistic, and there are still many problems. First of all, up to now, the number of refrigerated trucks in China is only 30000, while the number of refrigerated trucks in the United States has reached 200000. Many fruits and vegetables have no conditions to use cold chain transport vehicles and can only be transported by ordinary trucks, resulting in a high loss rate of fruits and vegetables, which has brought huge economic losses to relevant enterprises. Secondly, the current cold chain transport in China is mainly railway transport and road transport, and the timeliness of road transport and railway transport cannot be guaranteed. Even in the low temperature environment, fruits, vegetables and meat will also have a little rot and deterioration. At present, only a few fruits and vegetables can be transported by air. How to improve the proportion of air transportation and optimize the configuration of cold chain logistics are important issues that logistics enterprises need to consider. Finally, China's cold chain logistics transportation facilities have low technical content of refrigeration facilities, large resource consumption, poor refrigeration effect, and backward temperature control technology, which cannot ensure the stability of the low-temperature environment. On the one hand, the cost of cold chain logistics transportation remains high, on the other hand, it increases the possibility of food deterioration.
（2） Serious waste of cold chain logistics resources
Up to now, China's cold chain logistics transportation has not formed a scale, which makes the waste of cold chain logistics resources very serious, as shown below: First, at present, China's cold chain logistics transportation is generally one-way, that is, after the fruits, vegetables and meat are transported to the destination, refrigerated vehicles generally return empty, which makes the fuel cost, driver cost and vehicle cost of refrigerated vehicles increase greatly. Secondly, at present, many cold chain logistics enterprises in China do not have transportation routes to optimize and adjust, and drivers change transportation routes at will from time to time, which leads to the increase of refrigerated truck transportation mileage and affects the economic benefits of cold chain logistics enterprises. In addition, the problem of traffic jam often occurs in China, and the relevant personnel have not made reasonable planning for the transportation route. The return detours of refrigerated vehicles often occur due to traffic jam, road closure and other problems, which leads to the greatly reduced efficiency of cold chain transportation. Finally, the fruits and vegetables that need cold chain transportation at present are not concentrated enough. In some places, there are many cold chain transportation resources, while in some places, there are very few cold chain transportation resources. As a result, many refrigerated vehicles are not full at all, which increases the cost of cold chain transportation to a certain extent.
（3） The cold chain logistics distribution service is not in place
Nowadays, people put forward higher and higher requirements for the quality and timeliness of fresh foods such as fruits and vegetables. However, the delivery service of cold chain logistics transportation is very inadequate, which affects the economic benefits of cold chain logistics transportation to a certain extent. First of all, the problem of untimely delivery often occurs in the cold chain transportation process. In addition, the low temperature protection work is not in place, which leads to food deterioration from time to time. This not only affects people's shopping experience, but also makes related enterprises suffer huge losses. Secondly, the current cold chain logistics transportation lacks the sense of innovation. It blindly follows the traditional distribution mode and transportation methods. The information technology is not used properly, the service to customers is not in place, and the last kilometer problem is always unsolvable. As a result, many people are unwilling to buy fresh food through e-commerce platforms, which restricts the development of cold chain logistics transportation. In the case of an unsaturated quantity of cold fresh food, The cost of cold chain logistics will also increase significantly. Finally, fresh foods such as fruits and vegetables are generally produced in rural areas. However, due to the inadequate construction of transportation facilities in rural areas and the imperfect cold chain transportation equipment, there is a big problem in the connection between the cold chain transportation and the production base. In the process of multiple turnover, storage and handling, the cost of cold chain transportation remains high.
（4） Lack of talents in cold chain logistics cost management
In order to achieve better results in cost management of cold chain logistics, a large number of professional and high-quality cost management talents are needed. However, at present, most cold chain logistics enterprises are very short of cost management talents. First of all, in order to reduce expenses, many cold chain logistics enterprises in China do not recruit professional cost management personnel, but send a random employee to take charge of cost management. These personnel can only simply summarize cost information, and do not carry out proactive cost management measures at all, leading to a very low level of cost management in cold chain logistics enterprises. Secondly, the development of cold chain logistics transportation is very fast, and the ideology and management skills of cost management personnel also need to keep pace with the times. However, the cold chain logistics enterprises have not provided targeted training for cost management personnel, resulting in that the ideology and skills of cost management personnel are always at a low level, unable to improve the cohesion of various links of cold chain transportation, and unable to strengthen cost control, resulting in the cold chain logistics can not make ends meet. Finally, cold chain transportation is an emerging industry, and the whole country is short of cold chain logistics cost management talents. Many colleges and universities have not set up the cold chain logistics cost management specialty, which makes the cold chain logistics cost management talent reserve work in China very inadequate, unable to implement strong management and control of the cold chain logistics cost.
2、 Improvement measures for cost management of cold chain logistics
（1） Strengthen the construction of hardware facilities for cold chain transportation
In the future development process, logistics enterprises should do a good job in the construction of hardware facilities. The specific measures are as follows: First, cold chain logistics enterprises should clearly realize that China's cold chain transport market is very large and has good prospects for development. They should actively purchase a large number of new cold chain transport vehicles, provide cold chain transport for imported fruits, fresh vegetables and meat as much as possible, and reduce food consumption, Improve the economic benefits of cold chain logistics transportation. Secondly, cold chain logistics can not be limited to road transport and railway transport, but should develop in the direction of air cold chain transport, further improve the timeliness of cold chain logistics transport, better ensure food quality, bring customers better service experience, so as to expand the market space of cold chain logistics, give full play to the cluster effect, and help cold chain logistics enterprises obtain greater economic benefits. Finally, the cold chain logistics enterprises should introduce advanced refrigeration technology and temperature control technology, replace the low-temperature refrigeration equipment with large energy consumption and poor refrigeration effect in a timely manner, fully ensure the stability of the low-temperature environment, so as to reduce the cost of cold chain logistics transportation and achieve better results in cost control.
（2） Improve the utilization rate of cold chain logistics resources
Cold chain logistics enterprises should optimize the allocation of resources, improve the use efficiency of cold chain logistics resources, and use the minimum cost for greater economic benefits. First of all, cold chain logistics enterprises should improve the use efficiency of cold chain logistics transportation resources. After fruits and vegetables are transported to the destination, they should contact cold chain logistics goods locally as much as possible, so as to avoid the problem of empty refrigerated trucks. Secondly, cold chain logistics enterprises should do a good job in logistics transportation route planning, reduce the transportation mileage of cold chain vehicles as much as possible, and reduce unnecessary fuel consumption. In addition, cold chain logistics enterprises should reasonably use map software and GPS positioning system to obtain traffic conditions in time, effectively avoid congestion, and use the least time cost and resource cost to transport cold chain materials to designated locations. Finally, cold chain logistics practitioners should reasonably allocate cold chain logistics resources, allocate more refrigerated trucks in areas with abundant materials, and concentrate cold chain materials in areas with scarce materials, improve the loading rate of refrigerated trucks, and reduce the cost of cold chain logistics.
（3） Improve the service quality of cold chain logistics
Cold chain logistics practitioners should establish correct service concepts, improve customer satisfaction, lay a good foundation for the further development of cold chain logistics, and make cost management play a greater role. First of all, cold chain logistics enterprises should do a good job in material distribution, deliver cold chain materials to customers on time, and complete cold chain material distribution with quality and quantity guaranteed, so as to avoid deterioration of materials and reduce unnecessary cost losses. Secondly, cold chain logistics enterprises should enhance innovation, introduce advanced information technology equipment, use big data technology and cloud computing technology to understand the essential needs of customers, and improve the cold chain transportation and distribution service mechanism based on this, fully stimulate customers' desire to buy fresh food, expand the scale of cold chain materials, and increase the income of cold chain logistics enterprises. Finally, our government should strengthen the construction of transportation facilities in rural areas, urge cold chain logistics enterprises to set up cold chain logistics storage centers in rural areas, so that fruit, vegetables and other agricultural products can enter the cold chain logistics link after picking, improve the operation efficiency of cold chain logistics, and reduce unnecessary expenses.
（4） Strengthen the training of cold chain logistics cost management talents
First of all, cold chain logistics enterprises should recruit some high-quality cost management personnel for the whole society, formulate scientific and reasonable improvement measures for the various shortcomings in the cost structure of cold chain logistics, improve the utilization rate of cold chain logistics resources, optimize the cold chain logistics distribution system, so that the cold chain logistics consumes the least resources and creates greater benefits. Secondly, cold chain logistics enterprises should strengthen the training of cost management personnel, help cost management personnel establish advanced cost management awareness, master superb cost management skills, and further improve the cost management level of cold chain logistics enterprises through expert training, network education and other ways. Finally, cold chain logistics enterprises should do a good job of cost management talent reserve and establish a good cooperative relationship with colleges and universities. On the one hand, they should provide good practice opportunities for college students, and on the other hand, they should provide cost management personnel with secondary study opportunities. Cold chain logistics enterprises can select some excellent cost management talents from colleges and universities as backup talents to ensure the smooth progress of cost management.
Only by introducing and cultivating a large number of professional and excellent cost management personnel can the cost management of cold chain logistics play a greater role.