Milk marketing in the organised sector- a programming approach to optimisation of collection and distribution

Abstract

Two milk collection and one distribution route were taken for suggesting a suitable transportation model for optimizing the cost of collection and distribution of milk in dairy plants. Three Vehicle Scheduling Models, viz. saving model (model 1) suggested by Clarke and Wright (1964) λ model (model II) and ∏ model (model III) suggested by Gaskel (1967) were used in this study. Since there was high variation in supply of milk by each society to chilling plant, median and third quartile values of daily supply of milk of two selected months for each season was taken as expected availability of milk. Maximum distance that can be travelled by a truck in a route was calculated by considering the time. Morning and evening routes were formed with median and third quartile values as expected availability of milk in each season. Routes obtained in all cases indicated that routes formed by model 1 were the best. In the case of distribution of milk routes obtained by the model I was found to be the best. Using traveling salesman problem technique, an attempt was made to check the optimality of the routes obtained by each model and found that the routes were not optimum in most of the cases. Refinement method suggested by Holmes and Parker (1976) was tried out for knowing whether any further improvement is possible in model I. In certain cases better routes could be achieved. From this study, it is suggested that for the route formation in dairy plants for collection and distribution of milk, three techniques, viz. Clarke and Wright method (model I). Refinement method and traveling Slaesman problem technique should be used in the order stated. Forty four dairy co-operative societies were considered in the analysis of performance rating and grading of societies. Seven parameters were taken and subjective weights were given to each of them. Total score for each society was calculated and based on it the societies were graded as A, B, C and D.