Amul
January 2011 Everyday Amul collects 9.10 million litres of milk(daily average 2009-2010) from over 13,328 village societies consisting of 2.9 million milk producer members. Its supply chain is easily one of the most complicated in the world. Amul is the largest food brand in India and world's Largest Pouched Milk Brand.
How to managers at Amul prevent the milk from souring? Amul Dairy has transformed the milk collection process for millions of small farmers by using an automatic, computerized collection system which reduces the time for weighing, quality testing and payment processing from a few hours with payment days later, to five minutes and immediate payment. Each day, milk is collected no more than 10 miles from the farmer with this nationwide, decentralized, collection process.
Silverstar Tracking Solutions has been enabling Amul Dairy to plan and monitor milk collection to optimize the collection process for the last two years.
Drawbacks of the Milk Collection Process before implementation of the SilverStar Solution
Milk collection at the designated centers takes place twice daily, at 6am and at 5.30pm. An Amul tanker arrives at the villages at around 10am to gather milk collected that morning and the previous evening. This tanker takes the stock to the Amul factory in Anand for pasteurization. Under the old scenario:
- No system was available to pinpoint the location of tankers during the collection process except by phone calls to driver. This system was flawed due to poor telephone networks in rural areas and dependence on the word of the driver.
- There was no way to monitor the movement of tankers in real-time.
- There was no system to monitor arrival or departure times at milk collection centers.
- There was no system to audit the late arrivals of tankers, or to analyze the best routes to take.
Present Scenario at Amul Dairy after the implementation of SilverStar Tracking Solutions
The SilverStardevices installed on all the milk collection tankers use GPS AVL technology combined with premier mapping to provide real-time locations and record historical vehicle activity. The user-friendly reporting features of gives fleet managers at Amul the control they need to manage daily milk collection operations.
- The fleet manager now deploys tankers with greater speed and efficiency, and accurately predicts arrival times or delays.
- Location Reports, Activity Reports and Work Hours Reports provide control over routes and collections.
- Detailed real time vehicle monitoringwith accurate start/ stop times,and idling/extended stop times form important monitoring tools.
- Managers see at a glance where their tankers are at all times, thus reducing dependence of mobile phone with erratic connectivity.
- Managers select and view any problematic tanker, or their entire fleet, or see if the tanker is moving at the optimum speed, or see if it is idling, etc.
- Managers map the shortest route and ensure that the tanker stays on its predetermined route, saving time and fuel.
- Managers monitor all unauthorized stops made by the driver and view the duration/location of those stops.
- Mangers generate collection reports for each tanker and transporter to monitor their overall collection performance.
Benefit brought by SilverStar to Farmers & Amul The on-time performance of tankers have increased - thus cutting down delays that potentially lead to the souring of milk. In case of an emergency, managers are aware of the exact scenario and are able to take an appropriate action. When societies and farmers call,managers are able to easily locate tankers and predict ETA. The chances of adulteration of milk have been reduced due to elimination of unauthorized stoppages or idling. Safety standards have gone up.