Since the early discovery of agriculture, humans understood the importance of moving goods from one place to another, because sometimes – well, most of the times – things are not needed right where they are produced.
So, if you think a lot has changed since then… you would be right, on a larger scale of things. Just think about the evolution of roads and means of transportation. To farming and packaging.
But if we take into consideration the last century, not much is different, although the need for a shift in the transportation paradigm is becoming more and more pressing as population grows and technology advances across all industries.
That is why we need to focus on identifying the best modern technological solutions to our transportation needs, those solutions that translate into an easier access to the goods we need, while saving time and costs.
This could start with curbing the need for drivers and addressing experienced driver shortages by implementing more and more autonomous transportation devices as soon as the option becomes available. Which is not tomorrow, but, considering how much progress has been made, a few years is a good estimate. This change could also help calculating the margin errors for losses due to food spoilage.
Another aspect to keep in mind can refer to warehouse robot pickers instead of their human version, especially in the context of increased demand for products driven by e-commerce sales. This cuts costs and increases efficiency, especially when you think that robots work wage-free 24/7.