I traveled to the other side of the world this past week (Feb 20th) to the CARE Bangladesh facility with our partners Dale Herzog from the UPS Foundation and B.K. De from CARE. The trip focused on reviewing new solutions for CARE to implement hand held barcode scanning devices for use in the warehouse and for food beneficiary distribution.
We worked across the street from the largest wholesale produce market in Dhaka where, starting at midnight, produce is purchased for use throughout the city by local merchants. By dawn the trucks are loaded and pulling out and the empty sacks are rinsed and laid to dry on the rooftop under the hot sun. For several days, we spent much time listening, white-boarding and planning out the food distribution automation project with CARE Bangladesh team members who shared a tremendous amount of their first-hand experience in managing the relief warehouse.
Our ultimate goal is to round out the complete supply chain by providing this last step of tracking the distribution all the way down to the individual beneficiary. This level of tracking and reporting will provide CARE with a great deal of transparency and rich information about their complete programs so they can become even more efficient in the distribution of aid.
We were treated with such hospitality and patience as we probed deeply into the daily operations trying to gather as much detail as possible and I'd like to thank our hosts at CARE Bangladesh for all their help as they are helping pioneer these new advances in humanitarian relief.
- Michael Ross, Aidmatrix VP Delivery
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