After a landslide victory in this year’s general election, Keir Starmer and the Labour party have moved into Downing Street and already started to make their mark on the UK. But, with this election win under their belts, the party has a lot of work to do.
One of the main commitments from the new government has been to kickstart economic growth. While this is a long-term challenge we can’t expect to be fixed within the government’s first 100 days in power, it has been positive to see the new chancellor, Rachel Reeves, already pledge economic growth as a ‘national mission’ and lay out her plans to ‘fix the foundations of our economy’.
To do this, it is vital for the new government to explore areas such as technological innovation within the logistics and supply chain sector. It is an industry that accounts for 8% of the UK’s economy, but is one of the key drivers for growth. As such, I believe this is where some of the biggest economic gains could be. By ensuring technological investments are made to improve the efficiency of warehousing and transport routes, we can build a more resilient and efficient supply chain system that better supports economic growth. Without this resiliency in the supply chain, the economy would grind to a halt.
As to be expected, the logistics and supply chain sectors aren’t top of the agenda this early on in Labour’s new leadership – we know this as Reeves focused her first speech around lifting the ban on onshore wind farms in England, bringing back compulsory house building targets and creating a government with a pro-business mindset. While the reforms set out within this speech are welcome, supply chains should matter to the government as their efficiency and resiliency has a direct impact on the availability and costs of goods, all of which are passed on to the consumer. This has become especially relevant given the current cost-of-living crisis where so many are struggling to put food on the table due to soaring costs.
Considering this, we want the new government to apply policies that address infrastructure, regulation and innovation in logistics and enhance national competitiveness, economic stability and sustainability. A strong focus on technological innovation in logistics ensures the sector can meet future demands and challenges effectively. For example, we’d like to see the introduction of schemes that ensure access to funding to build and adopt local technology is streamlined. In addition to this, we need to ensure the UK has a steady stream of students applying for STEM courses, so companies can tap into the next generation of talent. What will help boost the efficiency and resiliency of the supply chain and warehousing is to modernise operations through technology that ensures people working in the warehouse setting are focused on business critical and value driven tasks and let technologies deal with the repetitive manual tasks.
We know supply chain resilience is front of mind for organisations. In fact, more than 57% of them are increasing their investments to enhance the resilience of their supply chains according to Capgemini. This is something the Labour government must encourage as innovative technology solutions and their rapid implementation can enable more efficient and effective supply chains.
While its very early days in the new leadership, it won’t be long until the government is forced to take a stance on how to strengthen supply chains. Doing so now will ensure the UK is able to more quickly and efficiently deal with the challenges and opportunities this increasingly changing world, led by geopolitical change, throws its way.
By Oana Jinga, CO&PO and co-founder at Dexory
