Transport Insurance: Valuable Ally For Logistics Sustainability

TRANSPORT INSURANCE: VALUABLE ALLY FOR LOGISTICS SUSTAINABILITY

Fear: Jose Luis Anselmi

A few months ago, the authorities of the Brazilian International Transport Insurance Club (CIST) were kind enough to invite me to participate in their last Congress in a panel on “Insurance and Sustainability of the Logistics Chain.”

For this, and with the healthy intention of contributing to such a qualified audience and the hosts, I dedicated myself to searching for information and related bibliography on the subject and I was pleasantly surprised that transportation insurance when it applies a risk analysis and prevention policy contributes significantly to improving the sustainability of the logistics chain (and can even contribute much more).

Before continuing, it is worth putting the topic in context.

Logistics and Environment

It is estimated that logistics activity generates around 10% of the greenhouse gasses that deteriorate the quality of the environment. This is naturally due to the fact that the transportation and distribution of goods is carried out entirely by means that use highly polluting fossil fuels.

The advancement of technology, e-commerce and modern consumer habits, far from improving, have aggravated this situation, especially in land transportation, since the so-called last mile distribution has further atomized the delivery process to the consumer. final. That is, the frequency of trips multiplied exponentially; which, by the way, may be a reasonable explanation for why traffic jams continue when part of the population works from home.

In this context of growing concern about the effects of climate change, we see that society and companies are becoming aware of the importance of supporting sustainable and environmentally friendly initiatives. Initiatives of which, of course, insurers who try to be very active in supporting them are not immune.

However, what I don’t think is truly aware is the valuable contribution that insurers specialized in the transportation industry have been making for decades to limit environmental pollution, long before this was an issue on the public agenda. 

Sustainable Logistics Practices

In order to support my point of view, it is first necessary to know what good practices are recommended by experts so that the transport of goods is less polluting.

To do this, we will use the following table that comprehensively addresses the problem:

Classification of sustainable logistics practices (*)