Engage qualified personnel for transport units - President, logistics institute
The President of the Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport (CILT), Mark A. Amoamah, has charged organisations and institutions to engage the services of qualified professionals to manage their transport units.
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That, he said, was to enable them to apply, among other things, the basic principles of vehicle fleet management that included compliance, maintenance and tracking to save cost in the cause of their operations.
“When you have such qualified persons in such positions you are assured of the kind of management that is going to be applied in the fleet.
The act of management is to reduce cost,” he said at the opening of a two-day Vehicle Fleet Management Workshop in Accra last Wednesday.
This year’s workshop is focused on Optimising Fleet Operations and Fleet Management Strategy and aimed at controlling fleet operational cost, managing productivity and reducing risk by complying with regulations and safety standards.
It was attended by heads of transport organisations.
Mr Amoamah charged the organisations and institutions to ensure that they got the right people for their transport units and departments and “should not be using chief drivers as heads of transport units”.
Courses
Currently, he said there were various transport courses and programmes being run in the universities and other institutions of higher learning and that persons who had undertaken such programmes and courses were available to man their vehicles.
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“They are out there and you can get them. They go through continuous professional development training,” he said.
Mr Amoamah said transportation was a crucial enabler of all economic developments - providing people access to trade, health, market and education services, among others.
Vehicle fleet management, he said, was a function for all businesses and organisations that relied on transportation for their products or services and that “Well-managed institutional fleet undoubtedly drive valuable benefits for an organisation such as increasing efficiency in vehicle acquisition, fuel management, strengthening fleet compliance and providing competitive advantage”.
“It will interest you to know that the total fleet size for only three public sector institutions in Ghana is over 5000 vehicles. These institutions’ estimated running budget alone runs in several millions of cedis annually, covering operation and maintenance, transport logistics, human resources,” he emphasised.
Investment
The CILT President said the level of investment required careful supervision and management by well-versed professionals and practitioners to ensure that such expensive resources were utilised most efficiently and effectively to achieve value for money and organisational objectives.
“As an institute, we will not relent in our effort to contribute to the development of the country by continually sharpening the skills of Logistics and Transport professionals who are fit-for-purpose with the required cutting-edge skillset and attitude.”
As part of the broader national framework to improve service quality and reduce the risk associated with road crashes, injuries and deaths (CIDs), the National Road Safety Authority (NRSA) is enjoined by Regulation 87 of the NRSA Regulations, 2022 (L.I. 2468) to register transport departments and units of all organisations including Ministries, Departments and Agencies,” he said.
Welcoming the participants, the Vice-President in charge of Education and Professional Development of the CILT, Dr Andrews Osei Mensah, said there was the need for organisations to look at how to maintain their vehicles well.