Dr Xavier Britto Annual Endowment Lecture provides key insights
The Dr Xavier Britto Annual Endowment Lecture has been instituted in recognition of the excellent service done in the area of Logistics and Supply Chain Management by Dr S. Xavier Britto, Chairman of Kerry Indev Logistics, who is also in the Governing Council of Loyola Institute of Business Administration (LIBA), Loyola College Campus, Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India. Dr Britto is an acclaimed leader and entrepreneur who has built a huge enterprise from naught to great heights. And equally, he has introduced a number of seminal insights in the field that are imitated by many, even his own competitors. The endowment lecture intends to broaden his impact in the field of education to form and groom future entrepreneurs who would replicate his model entrepreneurship.
The endowment lecture invites an eminent speaker from the field of logistics and supply chain management to reflect upon the current trends and future prospects in the area. In the first of this lecture series, LIBA invited Mr John Parkes, Managing Director-Integrated Logistics, Kerry Logistics Network, Hong Kong.
The Director of LIBA, Rev. Fr. C. Joe Arun, SJ, welcome the dignitaries and audience and spoke about the Logistics and Supply Chain vertical. The inaugural address was given by Dr S. Xavier Britto in which he reiterated the importance of logistics for any economy. He spoke on the right mix required in transportation, how the logistics sector is among the top five employers in India, the growth of the logistics sector, cold chain logistics, and E-Commerce and e-Vehicles. He also highlighted the important government initiatives like PM Gati Shakti, ULIP, National Logistics Policy and National logistics laws.
Mr John Parkes then addressed a wide-ranging audience of executives from the logistics industry as well as students of LIBA on “Logic of Logistics in Building Technology Enabled Future”, on March 24, 2023 at LIBA. He gave an overall view on the future trends and innovations in supply chain and logistics. He explained how currently the world and the supply chain are facing different challenges. The six key trends, namely, region-wide growth, b2c now to b2b soon, demographic drivers, localised business models, manufacturing spillover, and ESG on the rise, provided us various dimensions of logistics and supply chains, he pointed out.
He reiterated the importance of technology and how it is used in end-to-end supply chain.
Finally, he gave his perspective on the Indian economy, how factories are moving to India, and his predictions on Indian retail and consumption.
As part of this endowment lecture, Dr S. Xavier Britto has instituted an award, the Dr Xavier Britto Excellence Award, to recognise the best academic performance in Logistics and Supply Chain Management studies. This award is given every year to the best student of the Post Graduate Program in Logistics, a program of LIBA in collaboration with Kerry Indev.
This year the award went to Ms Sowmiya Alagappan Singaram, PGP 2021-22 batch, who scored the first rank.
The lecture saw a large audience of more than 700 comprising top executives and managers from various industries including logistics, full-time and part-time students of LIBA, and the faculty of LIBA, as per a release.
Source: Exim News Service: Chennai, March 28