Abstract
The increasing number of natural disasters in the last decade necessitates the increase in capacity and agility while delivering humanitarian relief. A common logistics strategy used by humanitarian organizations to respond this need is the establishment of pre-positioning warehouse networks. In the pre-positioning strategy, critical relief inventories are located near the regions at which they will be needed in advance of the onset of the disaster. Therefore, pre-positioning reduces the response time by totally or partially eliminating the procurement phase and increasing the availability of relief items just after the disaster strikes. Once the pre-positioning warehouse locations are decided and warehouses on those locations become operational, they will be in use for a long time. Therefore, the chosen locations should be robust enough to enable extensions, and to cope with changing trends in disaster types, locations and magnitudes. In this study, we analyze the effects of natural disaster trends on the expansion plan of pre-positioning warehouse network implemented by CARE International. We utilize a facility location model to identify the additional warehouse location(s) for relief items to be stored as an extension of the current warehouse network operated by CARE International, considering changing natural disaster trends observed over the past three decades.
Highlights
The increased number of natural disasters and intensified damage they have caused in recent years necessitate better coordination and planning in delivering humanitarian relief
Their model make inventory decisions with a budget limit and in the presence of acquiring, storing and shipping costs of the relief items, whereas the one in Duran et al [11] gives inventory decisions without a budget constraint since the locations suggested by the non-profit organization they collaborate (CARE International), are no- or low-cost locations
Low inventory level is preferred while determining the best possible locations for pre-positioning relief items due to two reasons
Summary
The increased number of natural disasters and intensified damage they have caused in recent years necessitate better coordination and planning in delivering humanitarian relief. Balçık and Beamon constructed a model to determine the locations and the number of pre-positioning warehouses to maximize the total expected demand covered considering a set of scenarios [10]. Their model make inventory decisions with a budget limit and in the presence of acquiring, storing and shipping costs of the relief items, whereas the one in Duran et al [11] gives inventory decisions without a budget constraint since the locations suggested by the non-profit organization they collaborate (CARE International), are no- or low-cost locations. We use the years 2007, 2008, and the first six months of 2010 to verify our findings
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