DHL Global Forwarding has turned to charter flights and China-Europe freight trains to help customers get urgently needed shipments of medical goods, pharmaceuticals and other items to their destinations despite a capacity shortage during the coronavirus pandemic.
Deutsche Post DHL Group’s air and ocean freight specialist is deploying its many years of expertise to meet rapidly growing demand for transport services in the Life Sciences & Healthcare segment. The business has successfully transported large quantities of protective equipment and medical products thanks to flexible solutions.
“We’re currently working faster than ever,” said Tobias Schmidt, CEO DHL Global Forwarding in Germany. “Our employees are working almost around the clock to get important deliveries to where they are urgently needed.
“We’re currently seeing a strong shift in demand towards products and goods needed in the fight against COVID-19. For example, for the past week, we have been transporting around 100,000 COVID test tubes a day from China to Germany and the Czech Republic for a customer specializing in medical accessories.
“We’re also still transporting everyday industrial goods and products,” Schmidt continued. “Flexibility and pragmatism are needed to meet demand as quickly as possible. We have been using numerous charter flights to ensure that our customers can maintain their supply chains despite the sharp decline in availability among our commercial carriers.”
Bottlenecks in supplying medical equipment, stricter controls at international borders, and the absence of airfreight capacity are just some of the challenges facing the logistics industry during the pandemic.
However, thanks to its specialists, its worldwide network of terminals, warehouses, and offices, and its technological infrastructure, DHL Global Forwarding remains able to effectively maintain supply chains. Despite the strained situation in air and ocean freight, urgently-needed protective equipment, medicine, and SARS-CoV-2 test kits in particular are still being transported.
Additionally, the capacities for complete trains on the New Silk Road have almost doubled in recent weeks.
In ocean freight, DHL Global Forwarding is also offering its customers business continuity solutions to avoid unnecessary transport costs and delays. Many customers use these tailor-made solutions to ramp up their business or production as quickly as possible the moment demand in the manufacturing industry or in the retail sector increases again. The goods are stored either in secured container hubs or warehouses near the destination, giving customers fast and flexible access to their items.
DHL Global Forwarding also supports its customers when existing options appear to be exhausted. Despite drastically reduced freight capacities, DHL Global Forwarding was able to make resources available on short notice to ensure good distribution practice (GDP) compliant transport of medicine. Over three weeks, more than 100 pallets of temperature-controlled medicine were delivered daily to China. Furthermore, a special unit load device cover designed to control temperature during transport saved valuable time.
When it comes to medical goods and pharmaceutical products, DHL Global Forwarding relies primarily on Frankfurt and Leipzig as its main logistics hubs. In close proximity to the two airports, DHL Global Forwarding operates state-of-the-art centers for transshipping medical products. Both locations are ideal gateways for European imports and exports, with temperature-controlled areas, dedicated GDP-compliant transshipment warehouses, and IATA CEIV Pharma and TAPA A certifications for internationally operating customers.
