Farm Products Warehousing Category Procurement Intelligence Report

Several macro changes in the dynamics of overall Transport as well as Farm Products Warehousing procurement trends are poised to change the business practices and procurement thumb rules. Managing the logistics risks and building a resilient supply chain has taken the centerstage among corporate priorities. Companies are investing heavily to be able to detect disruptions in time and respond in a manner which does not put the core operations at risk. All suppliers within the ecosystem are expected to play their part and embrace the processes, tools and technologies that their customers have implemented to build a resilient supply chain.

Businesses are focused on maintaining a lean inventory of raw materials, parts, components and finished goods. While it is a novel concept to keep the inventory costs in check, it also highly challenging to implement in a global sourcing context and requires a clock work like optimization of logistics and warehousing processes. Companies are moving to a completely digital supply chain footprint to reduce errors and risks associated with such strategies.

Rise in minimum labor wages across countries such as the US and China will result in increased employee expenses for Farm Products Warehousing suppliers who will be forced to pass on a part of this increase to their buyers.

Category managers need to take note of the potential of these developments and reassess the changes required in their procurement practices.

Sometimes, procurement functions are unable to timely alter their practices while responding to market conditions. Industry experts acknowledge that periodically reviewing procurement best practices and adopting learnings from across procurement categories can help procurement teams respond to market needs in a more agile way. This report combines our experience of other categories with Farm Products Warehousing procurement insights and hand picks best practices that can work for category managers delving in this market.

For example, Buyers prefer to engage with service providers that offer robust technological systems and leverage Internet-based systems to reduce cost and simplify visibility across the supply chain. Buyers should also assess the integration capabilities of software platforms offered by service providers to ensure that there are no additional costs incurred for software implementation.

Buyers should negotiate for administrative control over all technological systems that contain critical data. This will ensure 100% transparency and visibility over logistics operations. In addition, buyers should demand visibility across the entire supply chain using real-time metrics such as mobile and telematics systems.

Buyers need to discuss business goals and strategic imperatives with service providers to understand their mode of operation and establish control over important parameters of the supply chain.

Farm Products Warehousing procurement managers also need to proactively identify and mitigate potential risks that can arise in the supply chain or contracts for Farm Products Warehousing procurement. Some examples include: