Land Freight Transportation Services have an infrastructure and technology lag of more than 15 years. During this period, multiple agreements have been signed that push our transportation services to redefine themselves to improve.
There are great strategic challenges in the sector in environmental, infrastructure, technology and human capital matters to face in the search for a position in the logistics services scenario in the region.
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In the last 15 years, Mexico and Latin America have been actively involved in a transformation process that has required profound changes in many sectors, starting with reforms in the representative institutions of the Governments to the way each one of us works.
During this period of time, multiple conventions, agreements, and treaties have been signed between the countries of the region. This has implications in all areas of society. One of them is the transport sector; especially land cargo transportation.
In the infrastructure services sector of our countries, freight transport has had very few improvements in these 25 years, many of them have been due to indirect government support and subsidies (highway structures such as highways, roads, bridges, as well as schemes financing accessible to a few).
Freight transport services face multiple current challenges which we can include in:
A) Conversion to a Sustainable Service: Understanding Sustainable as the commitment to reach and fulfill current perspectives with the flexibility to adapt and meet future ones with the commitment to the environment, society and generating economic value.
Starting from this definition we are faced in principle that we have a large number of units in circulation with more than 15 years of service, which are in poor condition, therefore, they are major pollutants.
What is detrimental to the health of the population by raising various levels of pollutants in the air, as well as affecting land and aquifers. We could think that despite this, companies are profitable, here is the economic impact, costs such as the time of a team stopped for maintenance, successive and poor quality maintenance, the cost of unemployed operators, high insurance premiums for the age of cargo vehicles, fines for delays and breaches of contracts, environmental fines, accidents, among other charges.
All this projected in an indeterminate period of time may be reducing our profits by 30% and our growth by 60 or 80% broadly speaking.
B) Lack of Regional Leadership. We are currently facing the lack of this in all sectors. We have leading companies in their sector in each of our countries but we do not have a regional character. And I do not mean that a few companies become leaders, but a leadership of the Freight Transportation Service industry in the region, as a multimodal cooperation work in the Sector. This makes us vulnerable to transnational companies seeking a local position.
C) Almost Nil Technology Investment: Technology investment in the sector is lagging behind in our region compared to other regions of the world. This can be from technology in vehicles and facilities (fuels, suspensions, cargo boxes, cranes, refrigeration, etc.) as well as information and communication technology (satellite, positioning, tracking, navigation, systems, distribution, storage, labeling, etc.), key elements in the optimization and procurement of the service.
D) Expert Customer: Customers in all industries have evolved in this time. Information technology has led us to have a more mature and knowledgeable client, better informed, which allows them to have sufficient criteria for making decisions in search of their efficiency and productivity.
This requires us to also have efficient and highly productive services, with accurate and timely information at all times that above all facilitate the work of our clients and they can feel support, trust, security and responsibility on our part.
E) Professionalization of our operators: A key element and one of our fundamental challenges is the professionalization of our personnel, by which I mean all the members of our organizations. In this particular case, they are our operators, these personnel responsible for the organization, in their hands is our company, our business.
That he is well prepared is a duty and a responsibility that pays off in the satisfaction of our customers with meeting times, among other benefits. Our operators must know the federal and local laws on transportation and roads, as well as defensive driving and its best practices, not least they must know your vehicle and the basic mechanics to solve details that are presented. In general it is our most precious asset.
The transportation of land cargo or not in Mexico faces these challenges; These can be broken down into minor challenges. Let's not pretend to give a solution to everyone overnight.
Let's be aware that the needs are latent. Let us recognize that they must be solved, let us draw up a plan with achievable goals, and seek the necessary resources and support.
Let's not hesitate to invest. Let's look for alliances that allow us to grow through the transfer of technology and knowledge, not one that only provides us with an immediate economic benefit. Let's find new ways of doing things and become aware that the solution that worked for others is not necessarily for us.
Let us turn these challenges into opportunities and we will achieve the expected growth in our region and country.
