A Decision-Support Tool for Humanitarian Logistics

Abstract

Humanitarian missions are complex operations that require emergency resources to be delivered in a timely fashion to a disaster area. This article describes the development of a decision-support tool to improve the effectiveness of humanitarian operations through efficient inventory management and quick distribution of emergent resources for disaster areas. Such humanitarian logistics necessitate better coordination and planning. Unlike commercial logistics, humanitarian logistics demands from disaster areas cannot be predicted. Thus, to support a quick and efficient relief operations is important by developing ICT-based decision aids. A decision-support tool is just such an attempt, which allows the design of logistics networks for effective disaster responses. Such a decision-support tool may require the following two key decisions: determining temporary warehouse locations and deciding the means of transportation to points of destination (POD). The design of the humanitarian logistic networks includes: (a) a supply chain network that consists of inventory and distribution management, and (b) a logistic network that includes multimodal transportation of different scales for transportation times.