The Partnership for Supply Chain Management (PFSCM) recently collaborated with supply chain stakeholders to expedite the delivery of around $800,000 worth of HIV products for Mali, ensuring the continuity of essential HIV screening services.
PFSCM coordinated closely with the recipient in Mali, several suppliers, and a logistics services provider to deliver eight shipments comprising 27 different types of HIV products, such as rapid test kits, dried blood spot kits, assays, reagents, and consumables, an average of 152 days sooner than initially planned.
PFSCM Logistics Specialist Massimiliano Berti explains that orchestrating significant lead time reductions across different suppliers and products and arranging the subsequent staggered deliveries of the mixed batches of frozen, temperature-controlled, and ambient products from Europe to Africa is quite challenging.
“Depending on the type of product, international procurement, upstream logistics, waiver applications, and approvals for products procured with donated funds tend to take several weeks or even months.
“With the standard production and delivery lead times estimated, the initial orders agreed for Mali were due to be delivered towards the end of the year and early in 2025, but when the country expressed concern about inventory levels, PFSCM engaged the suppliers and logistics services provider to determine how the products could be delivered to the country a quickly as possible.”
Berti says PFSCM leveraged its open communication channels and good supplier relationships to secure stock on hand without any additional charges. He adds that PFSCM also worked closely with the logistics services provider to ensure the preclearance of the shipments consisting of more than 20 pallets at the destination airport without incurring extra costs.
Regarding clearing at the airport, Berti explains that the recipient in Mali and the logistics services provider – who specializes in humanitarian aid and relief – could release the goods while the waiver was being approved in the background; steps that would normally have to happen consecutively were executed simultaneously to save time.
“Owing to their many years of collaboration and trusted shared processes, these stakeholders can reduce common bottlenecks, like long waiver processing times, ensuring health products can exit the ports directly on arrival. This not only helps to get products to patients faster, but it also increases the likelihood of products being consumed within their shelf life.”
Further, he adds that health supply chain stakeholders must go above and beyond to simplify processes and overcome barriers in health supply chains.
“We see real substantial lead time improvements when partners uphold best practices for their portion of the supply chain, execute their work consistently, and excellently thereby enabling trust and transparency across the chain.”
Berti concludes that despite the complexity, PFSCM is pleased to have been able to help the recipient in Mali access the right products at the right time—and in this case, the right time was far sooner than initially anticipated.