The first-ever European Supply Chain Day was celebrate by the Chartered Institute of Logistics & Transport Ireland and its members with a series of events on April 10th last. Events were organised in Dublin and Cork to celebrate this important day for our industry. The day opened with a breakfast presentation which took place at the Mc Donalds restaurant on the Kylemore Road, Dublin 12. Paul Brennan FCILT (General Manager) of Martin Brower Ireland deliver a very informative and engaging presentation entitled “Future of Food Services Logistics 2020+”.

The presentation delved into the 8 Steps Towards the Future of Food Logistics, FSL  in 2020 and beyond, Meeting future customer expectations, Closing ranks in FSL, Innovating the FSL business, Sustainable living; products & services, Extreme Scenarios – Extending the Outlook of the Future, Opportunity Radar -Roadmap to the Future, Wildcards -Thinking Out -of -the Box, The Future is Now-The Value Chain in 2020.

Martin Brower Ireland is responsible for all aspects of the SCM for McDonald’s Ireland covering 110 restaurants and a turnover of over €200 million. Paul is also a Team Leader for Martin Brower, UK & France, responsible for 11 DC’s and supply to 3234 restaurants. He is a Fellow Member of CILT Ireland and a Certified Logistician, ES Log, by the European Certification Board for Logistics, Brussels, Belgium. The Institute would like to thank Martin Brower and Mc Donalds for hosting such a fantastic and thought provoking presentation.

The evening seen two evening run in Dublin and Cork. The Rochestown Park Hotel Cork was the venue which seen three supply chain presentations. Declan Coyne CMILT (Freight Operations Manager & Customs Compliance Manager with Flextronics) presented the fi rst presentation of the evening on “Achieving a Safe & Secure Supply Chain” and will look at the areas of: Regulatory Environment, Vendor Selection, Partner On-Boarding and Operational Activities by the Flextronics Corp and Declan has expanded into an EU Customs Compliance role for the Logistics Centres in UK, NL, PL & IT.

The second presentation of the evening came from Patrick Cummins CMILT and was entitled “Using Technology in the Supply Chain” and covered the areas of: Warehouse Management Systems, Voice Pick Technology and Customs Moving Towards Technology. Paddy Cummins CMILT has worked in the C&C Group PLC for over 30 years and had the responsibility of looking after the company’s end to End Supply Chain activities which included exporting goods to most countries in the world from Tipperary. Patrick also looked after the National & International transport distribution channels for the C&C Group PLC.

He is also an Associate College Lecture with CILT Degree Programme covering the areas of International Trade & Customs Law, and Operations Management. He is a Member Customs Consultative Committee of Revenue Commissionaires. Barry Purtill CMILT (Head of LLP & Control Tower Operations DHL Ireland) presented an overview of Control Tower (CT) & Lead Logistics Provider Services (LLP) for the Life Science Sector that is provided by DHL Ireland. Barry’s presentation looked at the following areas; Defi nition of CT & LLP, Overview of CT & LLP Services, and Key Customer Benefi ts. Barry Purtill CMILT joined MSAS Cassin in January 2001, through various acquisition, Barry is now with DHL Global Forwarding Ireland. Barry has worked in all areas of Freight Forwarding. Barry has also held positions Procurement & Air Freight Product within DHL. In 2006, Barry moved into the area of Global Control Tower / LLP solutions.

The Institute hosted a presentation by Dr. Edward Sweeney FCILT entitled “Understanding and Adoption of Supply Chain Management in Ireland” in the Hilton Hotel, Kilmainham, Dublin 8. Over 130 people attended this very interesting event in Dublin. Dr. Sweeney outlined that there is signifi cant evidence of a divergence between theory and practice in the fi eld of supply chain management (SCM). The purpose of his presentation is to disentangle the rhetoric from the reality in relation to SCM adoption in practice, with particular reference to the situation that pertains in Ireland. The presentation summarises the fi ndings from a recent research project which involved the use of focussed interviews with logistics and supply chain managers, focus groups comprising supply chain professionals from a variety of industries, as well as a major questionnaire survey.

All phases of the research used the author’s definitional construct – the Four Fundamentals of SCM – as their basis. This allowed a comprehensive profile of SCM understanding and adoption in Ireland to be developed. The findings suggest that, while levels of SCM understanding are generally quite high, there is room for improvement in relation to how this understanding is translated into practice.

A number of critical success factors (CSFs) and/or barriers to implementation of SCM theory in practice are also identifi ed, as are a number of practical measures that could be implemented at policy, supply chain and firm levels to improve the level of effective SCM adoption The Chartered Institute of Logistics & Transport Ireland would like to thank all the professionals who gave up their time and make presentations on European Supply Chain Day in Dublin and Cork.We are looking forward to celebrating this special day in 2015!

By Micheal Lynham

Below: CILT President Finbarr Cleary with Paul Brennan
(Metroplex Ireland) and staff from the Mc Donalds
restaurant on the Kylemore Road.