Freight Smart Cities:
Commerce Ministry’s Logistics Division unveils plans for ‘Freight Smart Cities’ to improve the efficiency of urban freight and create an opportunity for reduction in the logistics costs.
- Under the Freight Smart Cities initiative, city-level logistics committees would be formed.
- These committees would have related government departments and agencies at the local level, state and from the reacted central ministries and agencies.
- These would also include private sector from the logistics services and also users of logistics services.
- These committees would co-create City Logistics Plans to implement performance improvement measures locally.
- On the Freight smart city initiatives, the Logistics Division is working closely with GIZ (Germany) under Indo-German Development Cooperation, Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI) and RMI India.
- This is all the more relevant as the demand for urban freight is expected to grow by 140 per cent over the next 10 years.
- Final-mile freight movement in Indian cities is currently responsible for 50 per cent of total logistics costs in India’s growing e-commerce supply chains.
