About the lecturer• Dr. Qing Lu (Henry)

– Grew up in Shanghai, China – Lived in Singapore from 1994 to 2014– Came to IEU last September

• Contact informationo Office: C-808, Tel: 448-8295o e-mail: lu.qing@ieu.edu.tro Course materials will be posted online every week

• Warning ahead• No plagiarism (from other students or Internet)• Keep classroom order

• Two-way communication vital, let me know• whether you understand or not• anything concerned

LOG 472: Humanitarian Logistics and Suppy

Chain Management

Lecture 1: Introduction

What Is Humanitarian Logistics?

• A simple answer:– Logistics activity for disaster relief operations

• So we need to understand the cause first– What is disaster?

What is a “disaster”?Centre for Research into the Epidemiology of Disasters (CRED) (www.cred.be) defines a disaster as:

“A situation or event which overwhelms local capacity, necessitating a request to a national or international level for external assistance; an unforeseen and often sudden event that causes great damage, destruction and human suffering”.

For a disaster to be entered into the database, at least one of the following criteria must be fulfilled:

– 10 or more people reported killed– 100 or more people reported affected– declaration of a state of emergency– call for international assistance

(Source: EM-DAT Database – www.cred.be)

Van Wassenhove (2006)

Natural Man-made

Sudden Onset Earthquake

Hurricane

Tornado

Terrorist Attack

Coup d’Etat

Chemical Leak

Slow Onset Famine

Drought

Poverty

Political Crisis

Refugee Crisis

Classification of Disasters

Some Recent Major Natural Disasters

Event Date Dead/missing Displaced

Bam Earthquake (Iran) 2003 26,200 600,000

SE Asia Tsunami 2004 298,000 N/A

Hurricane Katrina (USA) 2005 1,833 N/A

Pakistan Earthquake 2005 80,361 3,300,000

Yogyakarta Earthquake (Indonesia) 2006 5,749 600,000

Cyclone Sidr (Bangladesh) 2007 4,406 2,300,000

Cyclone Nargis (Burma) 2008 138,366 1,500,000

Sichuan Earthquake (China) 2008 87,476 15,000,000

Haiti Earthquake 2010 230,000 3,000,000

Pakistan Flooding 2010 2,000 21,000,000

Japanese Earthquake/Tsunami 2011 18,000 N/A

Typhoon Haiyan (Philippines) 2013 6,300 11,000,000

Reasons for Continuing High Levels of Disasters

• More thorough and detailed reporting of the disaster wherever it occurs.

• Growth in population and vulnerability in zones of high hazard.

• Increasing technological vulnerability.

Reported Deaths by Disaster Type

Drought

Earthquake

Storm

Flood

Average Numbers affected by Disasters 1973-2003 (EM-DAT,

2004)Disaster Type Number of

Recorded Events

Total Affected Average Number Affected/Disaster

Volcanoes 123 3,000,000 24,390

Earthquakes 660 82,000,000 125,000

Wind Storms 1,864 557,000,000 300,000

Floods 2,156 2,600,000,000 1,205,000

Total Affected = Number Injured + Number Homeless + Number requiring immediate Assistance including displaced or evacuated people (EM-DAT, 2004)

Floods and Windstorms are showing the greatest Year on Year Increase in numbers and effect (EM-DAT 2006)

“The process of planning, implementing and controlling the efficient, cost-effective flow and storage of goods and materials as well as related information, from the point of origin to the point of consumption for the purpose of meeting the end beneficiary’s requirements.”

(Thomas & Mizushima, 2005)

Definition of Humanitarian Logistics

It is estimated that 60-80% of the expenditure of an aid agency is on “logistics”.

The annual expenditure of all aid agencies is estimated to be about $20Bn.

This means that the expenditure on logistics is around $10-15Bn.

In fact, aid agencies are logistics organisations - even if they don’t realise this!!

So the question is how can this big amount of money be spent more effectively and efficiently?

Why Does It Matter?

Textbook & Reading List

2

Humanitarian Logistics / Rolando Tomasini and Luk Van Wassenhove. Hampshire, Palgrave Macmillan, 2009.

Some additional readings from journal papers for more insights

Course Objectives and Overview

• Equip the students on humanitarian logistics operations humanitarian logistics strategies

• Two sections in this course

Overview of humanitarian logistics (disaster management cycles, humanitarian players, etc. Ch.1 to 2)

Some key issues in humanitarian logistics, preparedness, coordination, information & knowledge management, etc. Ch.3 to 6)

Course Evaluation• 10% attendance

– Attend lectures as many as you can• 20% in-class case presentation

– Arrange grouping and assignment as early as possible• 30% mid exam at the middle of the course

– Get familiar with the context during the lesson. Ask questions if you don’t understand.

– It is too late for a student to contact lecturer after the exam!

• 40% final exam at the end of the course– The last chance for you to catch up