SMS as a Tool to Improve Information Flow on Humanitarian Logistics

This chapter assesses the suitability of mobile phone technology, an established technology (humanitarian), to support humanitarian operations, create an inventory of support donations, and track the needs of people throughout humanitarian logistics after the disaster. The main objective is to reduce the exposure to the consequences of disasters by reducing the time of information flow through SMS interaction technology. Quebrada Quirio was used as a prototype. The process consists of using the INDECI rapid assessment visit to collect basic data, including a telephone number, of the people affected by the disaster, and based on this information, multiple initiatives aligned with the optimization of the flow of information were created.

Microbusiness Collaboration as a Strategy to Increase Resilience in Natural Disasters

Microbusiness, MB, importance for the global economy is uncontestable; they have huge participation of the world's production. In Peru, small-and medium-enterprises, SMEs, are 99% of the total of existing companies and contribute approximately 47% of the country's GDP; MBs are grouped within SMEs. They are the greatest generators of employment, although this may be informal and of poor quality. MBs confront difficulties, mainly due to their limited human and financial resources. Theories around how to deal with it have been developed mainly with big enterprises in mind, and this has little connection with what happens inside MBs. Accordingly, this chapter offers “collaboration” as a response strategy in case of a disruptive event to support MB resilience construction. This is contextualized from the experience of the Peruvian Costal El Niño 2017 and illustrated through the actions that a MB case (a beekeeper) took to deal with it.

Allocation Optimization Problem for Peruvian Food Bank

Food insecurity is a recurrent condition in which members of a household do not have enough food to cover their nutritional needs; this condition contributes to increasing social vulnerability of those affected. In Peru, there are more than 9 million people who suffer this condition, which generates malnutrition and anemia, mostly in children. On the other hand, the waste of food is associated with production the large amounts of greenhouse gas emissions that affect global warming. According to reports in Peru, 20% of what is food produced becomes waste. This scenario in terms of food for Peruvians represents 3 billion calories in wasted food that could feed 2 million people. The Peruvian Food Bank manages food donations, ensuring this food can reach people in need through humanitarian aid entities. This applied research work uses the tools of operations research to determine a solution to the problem of maximizing the combination of food orders to be distributed based on their total nutritional value to the beneficiaries, seeking maximum coverage and minimum logistic costs.

Implications of Activity Classification Aggregation in Urban Freight Trip Generation Linear Models

This chapter studies the implication of aggregating establishments by categories with different levels of detail for modeling FTG. To this effect, the chapter conducts an assessment of freight trip generation (FTG) patterns homogeneity inside activity-based grouping. The method implemented is econometric in nature, which allows the assessment of the statistical significance of variables representing commercial activity sectors and sub-sectors. The results show that for some sectors the traditional high-level aggregation includes sub-sectors with homogenous FTG patterns and thus produces appropriate models; in some other cases (e.g., retail, manufacturing), the sub-sectors have different FTG patterns and thus more detailed data is needed to calibrate accurate models. This research can be used to enhance the efficiency of data collection, as it identifies some sub-sectors that need larger efforts for data collection, and some other categories where FTG homogeneity allows for less detailed data collection without hampering the quality of the models.

Characterization of the Key Actors Involved in Humanitarian Supply Chains at the Local Level From a Theoretical and Academic Perspective

The incremental trends in the amount of human and material losses, added to a higher frequency of natural disasters, have generated greater interest from different sectors regarding the processes of disaster management. In this sense, it is recognized that the context of disasters is strongly marked by the high diversity and quantity of actors which seek common or conflicting objectives. The aim of this chapter is to present the actors involved in the humanitarian supply chains (HSC) and to highlight the importance of key local actors involved in disaster preparedness and response, the latter from an inter-sectoral perspective towards the importance implied by the coordination of the key actors in terms of the humanitarian purposes. The discussion developed allows for the inference about the critical role of local actors in disaster management and HSC, as well as several topics for the theoretical development of humanitarian logistics, such as the application of decision tools and information technologies, and the use of sustainability approach for disaster management.

Methodology for the Design of Traceability System in Food Assistance Supply Chains

The food assistance programmes (FAP) has the mission to guarantee minimum nutrition requirements in a vulnerable population. Nevertheless, the small deliveries for a spread population, the social conditions, and the limited technological infrastructure could make it difficult to adequately aid supply. To solve these limitations, this chapter proposes a methodology for the design of traceability systems in FAP which allows increasing supply chain visibility, coordination between deliveries and social conditions, and therefore, possible impacts on public policy implications. A qualitative and quantitative comparison of the conventional frameworks is carried out and contrast with the needs of the programmes studied. Also, new criteria are also added to adapt the design to the technological infrastructure and the socio-demographic conditions of the territory. The methodological proposal is applied to the Bienestarina nutritional programme in Colombia, where the technologies and tools to subsequently design the traceability system are proposed.

Tool for Decision Making in Humanitarian Logistics Chains

This chapter develops a decision support tool with a focus on the humanitarian logistic chain in a crisis environment considering process drivers' constraints such as costs, capacity, and throughput time. For instance, elements to reduce the suffering of the affected families, by using an adequate supply support for the first 72 critical hours. The authors will focus on minimizing the risks of shortages in the first response supplies in a high flood probability zone in Peru. This research presents different scenarios and it analyzes the representative variables (demand, civil defense warehouses, points of distribution, distance and logistics resources), the humanitarian chain value, and the effective distribution of the aid in the affected areas with efficient operations that balance between the economic and operative resources in this recurrent logistical problem. The results present three crisis situations with a distribution plan and a base of a public policy to prevent a crisis.

Assessing a Vulnerability Index for Healthcare Service Facilities

The rapid growth of cities in the 21st century along with the congestion of road infrastructure and high population density makes urban spaces highly vulnerable to disasters. After a disaster occurs, health services infrastructure is critical to support medical operations for injured patients. This chapter presents a methodology for evaluating the vulnerability of health services infrastructure from a logistics perspective, based on several layers of information such as population density, road congestion, and hospital location. The methodology uses computational and business intelligence techniques such as fuzzy inference systems, geographic information systems, graph theory, and visualization. The purpose of this methodology is to generate a unique score of vulnerability that identifies each health services facility, providing decision makers with the analytical framework of a spatial multicriteria analysis to evaluate their options for facing a disaster.

Planning Methodological Framework for Humanitarian Aid System in Colombia

This chapter proposes a planning methodological framework for humanitarian aid. The proposal combines project management tools and system dynamics to evaluate the effect of different operational strategies on the total system response time. System dynamics allows identifying humanitarian aid sub-systems and the feedback loops between them. The project management approach enables to recognize the response activities in each sub-system, to estimate the response time for each activity and the resources requirements. Also, the system dynamics tools enable the response times simulation under variability conditions. The proposal is tested in a retrospective way on the 1999 “Eje Cafetero” earthquake in Colombia. Additionally, the methodology framework provides a novelty approach to represent humanitarian logistics operations as a project. Finally, the integration of project representation, strategies selection, and system dynamic simulation is not enough studied in the humanitarian logistics field.

Modelling City Logistics Scenarios in Ecuadorian Big Cities Based on Multi-Objective Two-Echelon Vehicle Routing Problems

Classic formulations of the two-echelon vehicle routing problem (2E-VRP) reflect the perspective of a single provider. The lack of coordination between providers executing their individual schedules and, consequently, the lack of a holistic approach to urban traffic may cause further problems. Various stakeholders may have conflicting objectives. This chapter presents a multi-objective formulation of a multi-provider heterogeneous vehicle 2E-VRP from a city government perspective, demonstrating the potential benefit of this approach to all parties involved, simultaneously considering conflicting objectives. Additionally, the design and development of a multi-objective evolutionary algorithm (MOEA) for the formulated problem is presented. An experimental evaluation considering real data from Ecuadorian cities is presented to validate the proposed MOEA, demonstrating that it is capable to find good quality solutions, is scalable, and its solutions are improved throughout its execution.