The effect of supply chain security management on security performance in container shipping operations, 2012 (CORE1201)

Summary: The study creates a supply chain security framework that can be adapted on assessing how security management measures affect on safety and customs clearance performance in container shipping firms. Security management interventions are clustered in four categories: facility and cargo management, accident prevention and processing, information management, and partner relationship management. Findings indicated that container shipping firms that mainly focus on facility and cargo management and less on partner relationship management are generally more dissatisfied with their company’s customs clearance performance than companies that prioritize partnerships with governmental and commercial companies. The governmental agencies and commercial actors can employ supply chain security management framework, its attributes and dimensions in order to assess the supply chain security performance of container shipping firms.  The reviewed document is available at: http://dx.doi.org.

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Full review:  Several authors have clustered supply chain security measures into different categories, but only few authors have provided statistical models to test how well these categories can be used to assess benefits of security measures. The study establishes four security categories/dimensions: facility and cargo management, accident prevention and processing, information management, and partner relationship management. The results imply that partner relationship management is positively related to customs clearance performance. Further, information management and partner relationship management are positively related to safety performance. However, facility and cargo management and accident prevention and processing were not found to have substantial positive impacts on security performance what is controversial to many safety studies. Improved access control, material handling, information processing and reporting of anomalies are clearly factors that are positively related to safety performance based on several work place safety studies. The difference is probably due to questions that defined safety performance: the study addressed accidents and property damages while safety studies measure often near misses and their reporting.

The FP7 CORE project utilizes key performance Indicators (KPIs) to assess and monitor organization’s performance at the operational level. Two CORE KPI’s measure address safety and customs clearance performance, consequently the supply chain security framework can well be adapted on the CORE context. Improved access control, cargo handling, shipping information processing and reporting of anomalies can be measured by using the construct for ‘facility and cargo management’. CORE Training and education can be embedded into the factor ‘accident prevention and processing’ that captures documenting and disseminating of security information. ‘Partner relationship management’ can be tested as a mediating factor that controls how strongly implemented CORE interventions influence on organizational performance indicators in specific demonstrations. Customs agencies can consider using four dimensions of supply chain security as criteria for assessing security performance in container shipping firms. Finally the dimensions and attributes of the framework provide a tool to analyse qualitative data in the project where getting reliable quantitative data is challenging.

Reference: Ching‐Chiao Yang, Hsiao‐Hsuan Wei, “The effect of supply chain security management on security performance in container shipping operations”, Supply Chain Management: An International Journal, Vol. 18 Iss: 1, pp.74 – 85

CORE1201

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