President Diane Edwards reports on the CILT International 2024 Conference in China – Part 2.
In the last newsletter I reported on the official elements of the CILT International Conference, such as the AGM and various committees. This month I want to talk a little more about the presentations. In doing so, I am not going to talk about every presentation I attended. Rather I want to highlight the themes that emerged over the course of the conference.
The overall theme of the conference was “Leading Global Sustainable Development in Logistics and Transport”. This was interpreted in a number of different ways. The varied presentations may be categorised into four main themes: resilience; future technologies and fuels; supply chain alliances and trade agreements; and developing talent within the industry. It was pleasing to see that the subject of each presentation was often referenced in others, showing the interconnectivity of these subjects.
Unsurprisingly, for a conference in China, several presentations specifically focused on what that country is doing internally and the Belt and Road Initiative. The fact that the Conference was held in Lang Fang was a great opportunity to show off the supply chain capacity of Hebei Province. Lang Fang is a new town (currently just over 5 million people) specifically developed to increase the supply chain capacity for Beijing. As well as presentations on its logistical capability, we were able to view a state-of-the-art warehouse, automated packing systems and hear about the various transport options to take goods all across the region, the rest of China and beyond.
The issue of resilience within the supply chain featured in most presentations with the impact of covid still fresh in most people’s minds. Mr. Karmit Singh, Chairman of CILT Singapore, kicked off the topic with a passionate call for a greater need to develop resilience to manage risk. He used case studies from the pandemic, the cyber-attack on Maersk and industrial action in the US to illustrate the consequences of not building resilience into the supply chain. He was careful not to make the talk backward-facing, instead making the point that resilience should be integral to business planning. He emphasized that we must not dwell on what has happened but learn from our experience to build more robust systems. He cautioned about the decrease of competition through oligarchical dominance, e.g. the merger of major shipping lines, over-dependence on single technologies, and other single points of failure. The message was not about preserving the status quo. Rather, to be sustainable, we need to take the time to consider where different trends in business, politics, the economy and society in general might lead. Then we can diversify risk and put robust business continuity planning in place.
Another topic that spawned several discussions was around the future of technology. This included looking at how robotics and AI is changing the logistical landscape, as well as advances in fuel and energy. It is clear that robotics is now well embedded in our industry. We were shown examples of automated container terminals, autonomous vehicles, and the use of drones and robots within warehouses to assist with packing and inventory management. All, of course, were discussed in terms of efficiency and productivity gains. The clear message was that they are no longer emerging technologies but very much part of today’s reality. Autonomous ships are already operating in Norway, driverless trains are commonplace around the world, autonomous trucks and loading equipment is becoming more common, at least within controlled areas, and even pilotless aircraft are now being tested.
There was also no shortage of discussion on the use of data and digitally enabling technologies. The topic was introduced by Mrs. Zang Yu who is the Assistant Director at the Center for Intelligent Logistics and Supply Chain Systems of Tsinghua University. This was followed by Ross Xu, Director of Logistics and Customs at Alibaba.com who discussed Cross-Border E-Commerce. He noted that the volume of retail cross-border trade is increasing rapidly as Alibaba and other major players such as Temu and Amazon are beginning to dominate retail sales. This brings logistical challenges such as speed to delivery and management of multimillion bits of data daily. None of this digital economy would be possible without the advances in robotics and AI.
Mr. Abu Hanifah Bin Ayob, Postdoctoral Researcher from the Center of Global Business and Digital Economy at Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia discussed the transformation of Southeast Asia’s Trade and Logistics Industry under the Digital Economy. In particular, the population growth in South-East Asia and growing wealth within the region means that digital support for logistics is imperative. Dr. Kelvin KY Leung, President of CILT Hong also led a discussion at the Next Generation session in which it was clear that the younger members of CILT are well aware of the opportunities that technology affords.
The common thread to these sessions was the examples of how technology is enabling not just the super-fast processing of data but also the ability to extract value from that complex data. Sustainability was seen very much within the context of economic and social development in these presentations but less was said about environmental sustainability. This was left more to the presentation around fuels.
When discussing fuel, presenters fell into two camps – those who saw hydrogen as the future and those who believed that electric battery technology was the preferred route. Mr. Gao Yunhu, Former External Executive Director of Chinese Central State-owned Enterprises and Former Director of the Energy Conservation and Comprehensive Utilisation Department of MIIT was largely arguing for electric solutions but also acknowledged that hydrogen technology was rapidly advancing. He outlined what China is doing to develop a dual-carbon strategy and green low-carbon transformation within transport and logistics. He argued that the industry needs to allow time for transition and be clear about how to move from the status quo to greener fuels. Despite acknowledging that change cannot happen immediately, he was keen to point out that the transition does need to happen and its success will be measured by the timeframe to implementation.
While this session was the only specifically one centred on environmental issues, the topic was raised in many of the other sessions as well. For some, it was a matter of corporate responsibility, for others a regulatory requirement and for some a moral imperative. For all, there was a clear sense that countries cannot ignore environmental issues. At the most basic level, there is growing pressure from customers, but it is also seen as a major consideration in building alliances.
Two presentations of interest to me were talking about trade alliances from areas I personally knew little about. The first talked about how Africa is coming together to increase its strength through cooperation. The second was looking at the implications of the Belt and Road Initiative in Central Asia.
Mr. Jacob Gyamfi-Aidoo, Senior Advisor at the National AfCFTA Coordination Office talked about the need to liberate the potential for trade expansion across the African continent. He highlighted a number of opportunities for investors under the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) Agreement. Established in 2018, the agreement is the world’s largest free trade area bringing together the 55 countries of the African Union (AU) and eight (8) Regional Economic Communities (RECs) to create a single market for the continent. Whilst the free trade agreement operates within Africa, its size also provides a stronger African voice when negotiating outside of the region.
Marina Kuznechevskaya, Director General, Fly Dubai and Emirates in Kazakhstan spoke about the opportunities and challenges in air logistics under the Belt and Road Initiative. She was excited about the trade opportunities that the Initiative brought and believed it would invigorate supply chains within central Asia. She noted that there remain many challenges due to infrastructure, political unrest in some areas and competition for airspace, but overall she sees it as a positive development for the region.
The final set of presentations was themed along the subject of talent. They looked at emerging leaders, education and mentoring. As a core interest of mine, I attended several discussions on these topics and to do them justice I will discuss them in more detail in my next instalment.
I hope that you can see from the summary that the conference was varied, informative and challenging. If you are keen to attend the next conference, in 2025 it will be in Sri Lanka. More information is coming soon.