In a bid to ease supply chain congestion faced by the logistics industry, GS1 Australia and the federal government have launched a National Location Registry to help delivery location owners and transport operators.
The industry-led initiative digitises the management, storage, and sharing of attribute information about physical pickup and delivery locations, which can be then available to the parties involved.
Initially piloted by a group of stakeholders, the registry provides operating hours, weight and height restrictions for vehicles, entry points, driver amenities, and safety requirements for each site.
The registry aims to reduce the added stress on distribution networks and transport providers by encouraging as many businesses as possible to sign up and include their global location numbers.
GS1 Australia partnered with the federal Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Communications to develop and deliver the industry platform, which was designed to complement the government’s Freight Data Hub initiative and reduce the administrative burden on industry.
Transport operators would not need to maintain their own data set since location owners kept their own location data.
The impact of Covid on the global logistics industry has been extreme. In November, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) released its Container Stevedoring Monitoring 2020-21 Report which highlighted the repercussions of the crisis on Australia’s container trade, along with prices, costs and profits of stevedores at Australia’s international ports.
The report also found a few large retailers have bought their own shipping containers and are chartering their own vessels because of concerns about cargo not arriving before Christmas cut-off, along with some Australian exporters unable to meet their contract obligations.
GS1 said a critical element in gaining full visibility in the supply chain involves understanding the specific parameters of a physical location for a transport operator to complete a delivery. Since this information is often not stored digitally and is held in separate systems it results in delays.
To join the registry, a business must have a Global Location Number and then sign up here.
