<center><b>Connecting the Fragmented Supply Chain </b></center>
      <center><b>Focus : Multimodal Operations, Inter State Transportation ( Rail and Surface) and Last Mile Deliveries</b></center>
      <center><b>Date : 23rd April 2020, 10.30 am</b></center>
      <center><b>Webinar Report</b></center>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'>Logistics Supply Chain is critical for social and economic reasons and amidst the current situation it&apos;s the 
      need of the hour to ensure essentials supplies reach each and every corner of the country. From 
      Railways to Air , Surface to Waterways all the agencies are committed to support the end consumers 
      however a supply chain crisis is fast emerging and is impacting movement of goods of essentials , related 
      industries as well as deliveries to the end users across India. The logistic sector robustness is essential to 
      support raw material procurement to delivery of final goods for regional, national and international 
      trade. Disruption in the movement of goods weakens the network and disrupts both forward and 
      backward integration.</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'>Considering the issues of Indian logistics sector across multimodal transportation and the challenges of 
      movement of goods across the states and within the municipalities, ASSOCHAM initiated a national 
      meet of senior government officers across eastern, southern, western and northern region with key 
      industry stakeholders. ASSOCHAM Senior Vice President <b>   Vineet Agarwal </b> opened the session with 
      his welcome remarks and stated that challenging time such as these requires exception solutions. He 
      thank government for the supporting the sector while touching upon the demanding ground realities of 
      the logistic sectors. Interstate movements and other issues have impacted the sector and several 
      carriers are yet to reach the destinations originally planned.</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'>The program was divided in two panels ,<b> Chief Guest of the day   N Sivasailam,</b> IAS, Special Secretary 
      Logistics, Ministry of Commerce, Government of India was joined by   M T Krishna Babu, IAS , 
      Principal Secretary Transport, Govt of Andhra Pradesh ,   Gitte Kirankumar Dinkarrao, IAS, Secretary 
      Industries and Commerce, Government of Tripura,   Vivek Pandey, IAS, Commissioner, Trade and 
      Taxes, Government of NCT of Delhi (State nodal officer for E-commerce and Pan Indian Companies) and 
      to share industry perspective   R S Sodhi, MD, Amul Federation along with   Harpreet Singh 
      Malhotra, CMD, Tiger Logistics Limited joined in.</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'><b>Panel 1 Cross Border Transportation - Enhancing Smooth Operations</b></p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'>The session focusing on interstate movement, effective logistic operations began with an address from 
        R S Sodhi, Managing Director, Amul Federation and he talked of the challenge of the milk sector 
      where logistics begin with the collection of milk from farmers. He stated that initial challenge was how 
      to collect the milk from farmers and then to bring it the cooperative plants and then to move it to 
      several states of the country through 5000 road milk tankers and amidst lockdown such massive 
      operation and transportation was a major challenge. Being a perishable product with shelf life of about 
      2 days initial teething problems were of concern however constant reaching out effort to state 
      authorities paved way to the problem of transportation.</p> 
      <p style='text-align:justify;'>He also shared how railways service has been extensively used by Amul during this time to handle the 
      situation. He expressed desire of clarity in communication at down the line in administrative setups 
      across state to help ease the stress of the movement of the essential goods.</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'>To share perspective of a leading southern region state, <b>M T Krishna Kumar IAS </b>- Principal 
      Secretary, Department of Transport, Govt. of Andhra Pradesh spoke at the various efforts taken by his 
      government to ease movement within the state as well as support interstate movement.</p> 
      <p style='text-align:justify;'>1. The Government of AP has set-up a call centre (1902) to help the inter district and state 
      transport sector, so far the state has addressed more than 55,000 calls. The Government of AP 
      has also set-up a command centre in each districts to help the movement of essential supplies 
      and goods. The AP transport department has set-up a WhatsApp group to address the inter 
      state challenges and issues - southern states have been actively participating to address the 
      concerns. </p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'>2. The inter state observed only 25% of essential commodities movement in the state during the 
      lockdown. The AP Government has created an online portal to apply for e-passes for the various 
      sectors related to essential category. Also, an online grievance system to address issues and 
      concerns, so far the state has addressed more than 34,000 requests.</p> 
      <p style='text-align:justify;'>3. The Secretary was happy to share that the State Government was able to approve the SLA&apos;s with 
      in two hours. The state and district officials trying best to mobilize labour movement with in the 
      state to restart the work in relation to essential supplies and manufactures. The AP government 
      is looking forward for a graded relaxation in green zones to restart the economic activity post 
      lockdown. </p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'><b>  Vivek Pandey,</b> IAS, Commissioner, Trade and Taxes, Government of NCT of Delhi (State nodal officer 
      for E-commerce and Pan Indian Companies), while sharing the tasks already implemented by Delhi state 
      such as epasses, whatsapp group, easy access via phone lines ,   Pandey invited ASSOCHAM members 
      for inputs on further efficiency and improvement by the services as may be desired by the industry 
      members.</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'>He further added that Delhi has accepted epasses issues by neighbouring states such as Haryana,
      Rajashtan to ease the movement. Delhi has also started the concept of self e-passes by large responsible 
      organizations to help ease the movement of goods and people within the states as well as permit 
      movement of goods from neighouring states. Appreciating the fact that supply chain is complex and if 
      any bit of it broken it has long lasting impact, he admitted there was initially a gap in communication 
      where local authorities at the level of policeman were taking a while to interpret things differently 
      hwoever with collective effort of all the matter is resolved is to great extend and not trucks are being 
      stopped for interstate movement. He even raised concern on labour issues being faced as labours have 
      moved out and the new recruitment and training is a challenge for transportation companies.</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'><b>   Harpreet Singh Malhotra,</b> CMD, Tiger Logistics Limited shared his thoughts from the perspective of 
      international logistics. He stated initial issues existed as there was no clarity; clearance took longer 
      however things have improved. The major issue which is being faced is that there are high charges laid 
      in by shipping line. Another problem is with the detention of export containers. He raised other issues 
      such as liquidity and expected support from government agencies as well as large logistics companies to 
      join hands to support smaller partners to sustain well</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'><b> Chief Guest of the day   N Sivasailam,</b> IAS, Special Secretary Logistics, Ministry of Commerce, 
      Government of India, echoed the voice of speakers and laid emphasis on the participative culture and 
      invited institution such as ASSOCHAM to take up the responsibilities of managing the Covid-19 
      situations. In his words the industry is better understood by institutions such as ASSOCHAM and other 
      similar bodies and collectively these institutions should aim at creating a portal for the nation to support 
      logistics industry so that any transporter or any service in the remotest of the location can reach the 
      portal for help. Specifically with regard to Epasses he appreciated the app based concept by AITWA , but 
      encourage ASSOCHAM and other bodies to take up the task of issuing e-passes. He stated the Epasses, 
      E-invoicing by shiping industry is the future and is here to stay although it all became a quick reality 
      because of Covid 19. </p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'><b> Second Panel titled \&quot;Learning from states-railways, interstate transportation&quot;\ had presence of</b> Dr K K 
      Dwivedi, IAS, Commissioner and Secretary, Industries and Commerce, Government of Assam, K R 
      Jyothilal, IAS, Principal Secretary Transport, General Administration, Revenue(Devaswom), Government 
      of Kerala, Rajan Satardekar, Director Transport, Govt of Goa,   Mahendra Arya, BE, MIE, President, 
      All India Transporters' Welfare Association,   Samir J Shah, Partner JBS Group and inputs were taken 
      from   Prashant Sahu, Principal Chief Commissioner of South Eastern Railways</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'>Initiating the session to share state perspective ,   K R Jyothilal, IAS, Prinicipal Secretary, Transport, 
      General Administration, Revenue ( Devaswom), Govt of Kerala, said</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'> 1. Covid-19 is a great lesson to all of us. The truck movement has reduced from 2500 to 900 and he 
      also mentioned first in the country to open Whatsup group between industry members to Govt.</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'>2. Using Data & Technology for long distance carrying Pulses through Rail and Telangana helped 
      Kerala Govt in helping to carry the Pulses to APMC from the Last mile.</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'> 3. GPS is implemented with all trucks to track the movement and also to implement &apos;Vahan 
      Sarathi&quot;\ and also to trust people by issuing passes to their people.</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'>4. To understand the Milling and warehouse stocks and also to ease the business for loading and 
      unloading places in the last mile.</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'> 5. Screening is done at all ports, Airports and Railways for drivers.</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'><b> Dr K K Dwivedi,</b> IAS , commissioner and Secretary Govt of Assam , while talking with regard to the
      support mechanism set by Government of ASSAM , there is no permission required, once self 
      declaration by the organsiaiton to DM that all the necessary guidelines are being followed is good 
      enough to start functioning.</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'>He shared statistics of 300 rakes being brought in to the state and movement of 24 thousand trucks 
      being used to move goods with in the state and to neihbouring states. He shared that warehouses and 
      other key operations are being permitted that include tea auction. However he stated owing to other 
      reasons such as capital, labour shortage it&apos;s only about 2% of industry that has opened up. Responding 
      to concern of logistics hub operations requiring transshipment centers be opened up , he stated such 
      facility are open. He invited specific matter if pending be brought to the notice of government.</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'>In response to the query of movement of non essential by train service to Assam he reiterated that the 
      service is open by rail for both essential and non essential into the state.</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'><b>  Rajan Satardekar, Director of Transport, Government of Goa,</b> talked of several steps taken in the 
      state of Goa that included supporting migrant labour with accommodation to stop spreading 
      coronavirus as well as use them for services of industry within the state that require functioning as per 
      the guidelines of Govt. One of the key features was to extend permission to functional managers in the 
      states to issues passes. Proactive steps of ensuring well trained staff, ensuring supply of essentials right 
      up to the door steps helped state control the spread and is now working towards revival of the economy</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'><b>   Samir J Shah, Partner JBS Group</b> stated that ground realities are different as there is a wide variety 
      of industry community which is into exports. The larger organizations that have access to the police, 
      bureaucrats have been able to find the solutions and one can say that they have found a good solution 
      to receive goods and get staff daily. Whereas, the major chunk of medium enterprises are finding it very 
      difficult to operate. In spite of all the efforts being done by the administration, we are noticing that if we 
      look at any of the major facilities, they are outside the metros. They are surrounded by a large number 
      of small villages. A lot of Sarpanches declares close down of the village as a virtue of which servicing 
      units which were working on import and export have gone isolated. Another concern is Customs have
      made passes that were not validated by local police. Co-ordination between state and local authority is 
      missing. A huge gap in communication can be seen between local and state authorities. Urge the 
      government to help the medium sector of the import/export industries with more readiness.</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'><b>  Prashant Sahu, Principal Chief Commissioner, South Eastern Railways,</b> on behalf of railways 
      presented the facilities of express train for moving goods across the country, he shared there are about 
      70 trains per day that are moving across various routes and he requested ASSOCHAM to share
      information with members and ecommerce companies to use Railways as alternate mode of 
      transportation at this difficult time. Railways have also supported with passes, waiving of charges, etc. </p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'> Through ASSOCHAM he wished to communicate to Cement Sector companies to clear off the load so 
      that space can be used for movement of Essential goods.</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'><b>   Mahendra Arya,</b> President AITWA shared his concern over the communication and suggested there 
      clarity of understanding at ground level to be enhanced. He suggested states shall all come forward to 
      honour the circular of MHA and should extend easy passage to trucks and cargo. With regard to 
      movement of personnel especially drivers who have to reach to offices or hubs to start operations are 
      stuck as movement of people is stopped and getting people to reach place of work is becoming a 
      challenge. He shared the information of the mobile app being created by his organisation to support 
      issuance of e-passes and hoped each state would accept the centrally approved epass mechanism.</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'>Program was closed by Senior Vice President ASSOCHAM   Vineet Agarwal by thanking all the eminent 
      guests to have shared their valuable inputs and to have spared time at these demanding times.</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'><b>Key Takeaways for ASSOCHAM</b></p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'>1. ASSOCHAM to consider issuing Epasses as an institution - ASSOCHAM as an institution in partnership take up 
      the challenge of management and this can be supported by central authorities.</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'> 2. ASSOCHAM via its network promote usage of Railways as alternative</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'>3. Share information with cement industries to clear cargo thus ensuring availability of space for perishables</p>
      <p style='text-align:justify;'> 4. Share information with Exim community to clear containers and accept cargo deliveries</p> 
      <p style='text-align:justify;'> 5. Proactively support industry and connect with administration</p>