The present scenario of Indian Transport Sectors - A brief overview

Dec. 17, 2012 - PRLog -- The logistics sector (http://www.loadjunction.com/) in India is playing an important role in developing the stable economic growth of the country due. The volume of freight traffic movement has been dramatically increased in the country. This outsized level of traffic makes a huge grown in all aspects of logistics with transportation, warehousing, freight forwarding, express cargo delivery, container services, shipping services etc.

The logistics value chain in India is categorized in three primary sections that range from Transportation, Warehousing and Value Addition Services like packaging, Labelling and assembling, cross bundling, express services, tracking and tracing, express, cold chain etc.

Transportation is considered as one of the major sectors in Indian Logistics field which contributes to Indian GDP significantly. The transport segment is segregated in various sub-segments like road and rail which are mainly responsible for domestic transport of goods otherwise by water (ship) or air (express or courier), which are utilized for inter-country trade of material.

In India road is taken as the biggest method of transportation of freight shipment. As per estimation of the modal movement of cargo in India it is observed that almost 61% of the consignment is delivered by road, 30% by rail and remaining by airway, pipelines and inland waterways. This is in comparison with 37% share of road in the USA and 22% in China.

India includes the world’s second-major network of roads (3.83 million km after US’s 6.43 million km. The road transport network consists of 65% of the freight and 85% of the passenger traffic in the country. The road network in the country is vastly fragmented with the truck operators having less than five trucks anticipated to comprise more than 75% of the truck fleet. It is predictable that 10% of the market be owned by those with 6-10 trucks; 4% to those with 11-15 trucks; 3% be owned by those with 16-20 trucks; and only 4% of fleet be owned by those with more than  20 trucks.

The small operators are primarily liable for the physical transition of goods and mostly rely on intermediaries and other fleet operators who consecutively take the help of the booking agents for getting business. The small operators don’t have the ability to carry out the tasks like aggregating, handling, delivering of cargo and marketing. Moreover, they are unaware about the ecological reach and always lack of proper network & communication to avail business on long term basis. Thus they have to depend on brokers.

The big fleet operators are small in number and usually deal with all over the country. These fleet operators mainly perform on a hub and spoke model. With the help of the hub and spoke distribution model the fleet owners & transporters will be able to optimize costs and ensure high incomes.

These transport companies normally make official contracts with the customers, which become very difficult for the small operators. Large operators have the ability to bid for the contracts with customers. They undertake the services of the smaller operators whey they need any additional vehicles.

To overcome these cumbersome and completed process some companies like Suain Logistics has introduced load board (http://www.loadjunction.com/) concept first time in India for transporters, truck operators, brokers, industralist and anyone who engaged in transport industry of India. They have launched loadjunction.com, an online portal through which a fleet owner can find available freight described in detail and can submit online quotes for negotiation. The fleet owners and truckers can also post their trucking equipment details to get a call from loader.  The online portal creates a huge network of loads & trucks and at the same time matches loads & trucks. One can also get real-time time rates on different routes on PAN India basis.  This online portals will provide a wide array of benefits like Find trucks for load, abolition of deadhead miles, getting good paying backhauls, Find Return Load for trucks, find accessibility of all sizes and types (container, trailer, flatbed etc.) of trucks, Providing truck freight rates across India, radius search for trucks and loads, instant truck and load matching, Instant SMS and email alerts for available loads and trucks and so many.