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PRESERVING THE ENVIRONMENT — FROM THE PLANT TO THE CONSUMER
Alternative
transport solutions
Bel uses a transport and warehouse grid to make its products available to consumers. In addition,
Bel employees must travel to and from the workplace. Reducing transport is a good way to lower
the Group’s environmental impact.
Bel has always based
the selection of its plant
locations on two key
factors, including raw
materials availability, i.e.
dairy producing regions for
supplies of fresh and primary processing
products, and nearness to markets,
to limit the distance between its plants
and consumer catchment areas.
Closer to consumers
Getting products to the end consumer
requires a cold transport and storage
organization, which by its very nature
can be energy intensive. However, along
44 • Bel Group 2011
with its retailers and supply chain
service providers, the Group has
identified simple and effective solutions
for lowering greenhouse gas emissions.
These solutions are based on optimizing
truck fill rates and delivery frequency,
as well as alternative transport
initiatives. Working together with its
partners has led to steady and
meaningful improvement.
Bel gets involved in
multimodal transport
Multimodal transport involves a
combination of several types of
transport to get from one point to
another, such as so-called piggyback
solutions that use both rail and road
transport. This solution was successfully
tested to move products from plants in
western France to a warehouse in Lyon,
with corresponding CO2 emissions cut
by 33%. In addition, a program was
launched a year ago to transport
Leerdammer ® from the Netherlands to
Italy (see best practice on page 45) via
an alternative solution. The idea was to
maintain the same flexibility offered by
road transport (and even improve it),
while taking advantage of the lower
energy and environmental costs
offered by rail.
85%
of Leerdammer ® cheese
transport fl ows from Rotterdam,
Netherlands to Milan, Italy are
now provided by rail