On Tuesday, the Biden administration and the U.S. Department of Transportation announced the launch of a new initiative to improve the nation’s supply chain.
Called the Freight Logistics Optimization Works (FLOW), the initiative aims to speed up delivery times and reduce consumer costs. The administration said that the initiative will improve information sharing between key shareholders representing parts of the goods movement supply chain, including 18 initial participants representing private businesses, trucking, warehousing and logistics companies, and ports.
Leaders in the retail industry applauded the initiative.
“We are honored to be recognized as a leader in supply chain management and asked to serve on this White House task force,” said Chris Kempa, CEO of the True Value Company. “These have been exceptional times, and I’m very proud of the innovative solutions our entire operations, merchandising, and inventory teams employed to get products to our retailers as quickly as possible.”
Members of the port industry also applauded the move.
“We look forward to helping drive this important initiative forward,” said Gene Seroka, executive director of the Port of Los Angeles. “This nationwide supply chain data visibility effort will support system resiliency, improve our trade competitiveness and empower American businesses to get products to market with greater consistency and reduced cost.”
Improving transparency and access to data will improve the supply chain’s speed and accuracy, shareholders said.
“There are currently limited pathways for digitalized data to travel freely across the end-to-end supply chain,” Thomas Bagge, CEO of Digital Container Shipping Association (DCSA), said. “As a result, ‘blind spots’ exist along the shipment journey, making supply chains less predictable and hence, less reliable. Having an interoperable digital infrastructure will help eliminate blind spots by increasing the availability and reliability of data. DCSA and its members are committed to contributing to the Department of Transportation initiative to create a standards-based, interoperable digital infrastructure.”