Logistics Management: The Significance Of Logistics Management

10.1.1 Introduction

The term logistics comes from the French word logistique (loger means to lodge) The New Oxford American Dictionary defines logistics as "the detailed coordination of a complex operation involving many people, facilities, or supplies," Logistics is commonly seen as a branch of engineering that creates "people systems" rather than "machine systems."

Logistics management is the part of supply chain management that plans, implements, and controls the flow and storage of goods, services, and related information from origin to consumption of the product. Logistics is generally defined as the detailed organization and implementation of a complex operation. In a general business sense, logistics is the management of the flow of things between the point of origin and the point of consumption in order to meet requirements of customers or corporations. The resources managed in logistics can include physical items such as food, materials, animals, equipment, and liquids; as well as abstract items, such as time and information. Logistics of usually involves the integration of information flow, material handling, production, packaging, inventory, transportation, warehousing, and often security.

Logistics management is the governance of supply chain functions. It typically includes

Logistics management is part of all levels of planning and execution -- strategic, operational and tactical. It is an integrating function, which coordinates all logistics activities, as well as integrates logistics activities with other functions including marketing, sales manufacturing, finance, and information technology. The complexity of logistics can be modeled, analyzed, visualized, and optimized by dedicated simulation software. The optimization of the use of resources is a common objective in all logistics