July 31, 2023 • 30 mins
In the wake of a disaster, restoring supply chains can be critical in assuring that the most vital needs of affected communities are met.
In this episode, Tim Russell and Lauren Finegan of the MIT Humanitarian Supply Chain Lab discuss the fundamentals of humanitarian logistics and disaster response—including how to best build resilient communities, how the public and private sectors can work together for optimal disaster response, and how their research and work helps inform and strengthen disaster response work worldwide.
Learn more about the work of the MIT Humanitarian Supply Chain Lab.
Host & Executive Producer: Benjy Kantor Marketing Writer & Producer: Dan McCool Sound Editor: David Benjamin Sound Audio Engineer: Kurt Schneider
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
(bright music)
- Welcome to MIT Supply Chain Frontiers
from the MIT Center forTransportation and Logistics.
Each episode featurescenter researchers and staff
or experts from the fieldfor in-depth conversations
about business, education, and beyond.
- Welcome to today's episodeof Supply Chain Frontiers
brought to you by the MIT Center
for Transportation and Logistics.
(00:22):
I'm Benjy Kantor,
and today we're gonna betalking to Tim Russell
and Lauren Finegan of CTL'sHumanitarian Supply Chain Lab.
Tim, Lauren, nice to have you.
- Great to be here.
- Thanks for having us.
- The mission of the MITHumanitarian Supply Chain Lab
is to understand and improvethe supply chain systems behind
public services and privatemarkets to meet human needs.
Tim Russell, one of our two guests,
(00:43):
is a research engineer
at the MIT Humanitarian Supply Chain Lab.
He's worked on humanitarian supply chains
across the Caribbean, Latin America,
former Yugoslavia and East Africa.
Tim's also graduate of theMIT Supply Chain Management
masters program here at CTL.
And Lauren Finegan is a researchassociate here at the lab.
Lauren supports researchsponsored by government agencies
and promotes evidence-informedpolicy through outreach
(01:05):
with public and private stakeholders.
And she's also an MIT grad
having her intern master's intechnology and policy here.
So actually to start off,
I'd love to hear just a littlebit of general information
about Humanitarian Supply Chain Lab,
particularly with regardto disaster preparedness
and response work.
What are the kind of thingsthat you are working on?
- Thanks, Benjy.
So I guess I'll start maybewith a little bit of background
(01:29):
and just say that theHumanitarian Supply Chain Lab
was founded by Dr. Jarrod Goentzel.
After the 2010 earthquake in Haiti,
that's when he started focusingon this kind of full-time.
And so we work on a lotof different things,
but on the disaster side,
what we like to do is combine
several different fields like engineering
(01:51):
and supply chain management
and some social sciences and economics
and bring it all together
and try to understand what's going on
with the whole supply chainsystems around disasters.
- And, Lauren, what arethe most current things
that you're working on
and considerations thatyou have to be making
especially as we enter this season?
- Hurricane seasonofficially starts June 1st,
(02:13):
so we're well into hurricane season now.
I will say that the greatestactivity in hurricane season
usually isn't until theAugust-September timeframe,
and sometimes into October.
But the work that theHumanitarian Supply Chain Lab does
is part educational to sort of explain
(02:34):
supply chains in the disaster context
to emergency management audiences.
That's one key piece of what we do.
And we also do a lot ofresearch to understand
how supply chains adapt after disasters
to meet the needs of survivors.
(02:54):
So how does the private sector,
primarily private sectorsupply chain actors,
how do they adapt to make surethat grocery stores stay open
and that people can get the goods
that they need to recover from disasters?
So our research centersaround how that happens
and how the public sector,
(03:15):
agencies like FEMA andother agencies involved
in disaster response contribute to that
overall recovery of the supply chains.
- What is the quick rundownof disaster response?
Like disaster response 101?
What are the essential thingsthat people are hearing about
maybe in little pieces,
(03:37):
but that would have to do withhow supply chain is involved
and how integral it is to the process
of getting aid to places?
- My quick response to that is that,
I guess I'll share two examplesthat are probably recent
in people's minds about how
supply chain impacts disaster response.
One is the COVID-19 pandemic.
(03:59):
We all remember in the earlydays when you couldn't get
things like toilet paper,
and more critically asthe pandemic wore on,
how supplies like masks and 95 masks
and things like that weren't available.
And also how grocery storeshelves were under-stocked
(04:19):
as the people operating thesupply chain at various points
came down with COVID-19 andthe things couldn't move
as they normally wouldfor a variety of reasons.
Both the people,
the access in and out of different areas.
I know Tim has some experience studying
the freight supply chain after COVID-19
(04:41):
or during the COVID-19 pandemic,
and how that was impacted
by different restrictions of travel
in and out of different places.
The second example is notnecessarily a natural disaster
or a weather-related disaster,
but the colonial pipelineransomware attack.
(05:02):
So in May of 2019, therewas a ransomware attack
on the colonial pipeline.
And a ransomware attack,
how it works basicallyis hackers send a message
or something to an entity,
and they essentially hold hostage
a piece of your system
or data that's criticalin running your system.
(05:25):
They hold somethinghostage and ask for ransom,
a ransom payment in orderto release that data
or allow your system toreturn to normal functioning
to sort of get rid ofthe bug that has stopped
the functioning of your system.
And so that was the type of attack
that impacted the colonial pipeline.
The colonial pipeline precautionary
(05:46):
shut down pieces of its system,
which delayed the normaldelivery of fuel in some places,
but not for very long.
And again, as I mentioned earlier,
it was well within thestock that the terminals
along the pipeline hadto meet normal demand.
The issue arose when we saw panic buying
(06:08):
and runs on gas at the pumps.
And that was way above whatnormal demand would have been
had there been noindication of this issue.
That pipeline is part ofa larger fuel supply chain
and the spike in demand meant
that some gas stations were out of gas.
(06:28):
Now that was not necessarilybecause of a lack of supply.
There were was actuallyadequate supply in those areas
to meet normal demand,
but when we saw the sort of panic buying
and the spike in demand,that's when supplies ran out.
So I think those are twoexamples that kind of illustrate
(06:49):
for me at least the role thatsupply chains play oftentimes
in the background of getting people
the things they need in disasters,
and also the impact thatindividual decisions
like the decision for everyone
to go to the gas station at the same time,
and public policydecisions like the decision
for there to be travelrestrictions in and out of an area
(07:11):
or curfews have on the normaloperations of supply chains.
- When you don't know whenyou're gonna need to implement
some sort of disaster relief,
how do you activate allof the different parts
of the supply chain and logistics
so that, in aggregate, thingsget to where they need to be.
So for instance,
(07:32):
if the fuel gets halfway to Florida
when they're having some storms,they need additional fuel,
but there's no trucks totake it the rest of the way
or when the trucks are there,
but there's no driver totake it the rest of the way.
How do all the differentpieces get compiled together
and get activated
so that things get towhere they need to be?
- It's a good question, Benjy.
I mean Lauren kind of talkedabout this when she was talking
(07:54):
about how people respond to disasters,
and I think I'd like to take one step back
and kind of say that I think
when we're talking about disaster relief
in the United States,
it's more of making sure that the people
that have needs aregetting their needs met.
And it's not just a specific response,
(08:14):
but it's making sure that theprivate sector is working,
making sure that thegovernment can respond
and do search and rescue
and take care of thereally important needs
of the affected population,
like making sure that the hospitals are up
or making sure thatpeople in nursing homes
are taken care of,
making sure that foodand water are available
(08:35):
for people in shelters.
But when a disaster happens,
a lot of what's going onis the same sorts of things
that happen pre-disaster.
It's just you have to dealwith a lot of uncertainty
and not knowing often exactlywhere problems are happening,
where there's flooding,where roads are closed,
(08:56):
which places have powerso they can accept loads.
A lot of that sort of communication stuff
is part of what kind of needs to happen
from either business to business
or from the government to the public.
And so a lot of that coordinationeffort is kind of key to
making sure that thesupply chains keep moving
(09:16):
and moving ways that make sense.
- Is there a example of a success story
in so much as there can be a success story
in the wake of a disaster,
but success in terms of allthese pieces kind of coming
together and getting thingsto where they need to be?
- Yeah, I mean, we've seen over time,
states that respond to disasters often
(09:37):
are getting better at this sort of work.
And so I'll give you an example.
During Hurricane Ian,
category five storm thatcame ashore in Florida
near Fort Myers late September 2022,
caused lots of widespreaddamage across the state,
lots of flooding, winddamage, power outages.
But the state of Florida
(09:57):
and their Emergency Operation Center,
they stood up a call withthe fuel wholesalers.
And so these are the peoplethat go to the terminals
that have big stockpiles of fuel
and then they put itin their tanker trucks
and take it to gas stations, right?
And so there was work doneby the state to have a call
with these really key supplychain partners to understand
(10:21):
what terminals were up,
where they were having troublegetting access to terminals,
where they needed help
being able to get fuel to retail stations,
and just this little bit of coordination
enabled the response to flow much smoother
and to make sure that everybody knew
what was happening andwas on the same page.
(10:43):
And so just shining a lighton these things and having
people being able to have achance to talk to each other
and to be able to ask questionsthat on the next call,
the state can come back and answer,
that's a success story, right?
- Yeah.
And one thing I wanna addto what Tim said there
is what makes some of that so successful
is the relationships thatare managed and built
(11:06):
ahead of the disaster so thatthe state knows who to call,
and the private sectoroperators on the other side know
who to call at the state tofacilitate that coordination.
So it's building thoserelationships ahead of time that
really allows for that coordination
and that informationsharing when, as Tim said,
(11:27):
there's not a lot of...
Oftentimes there's thesituational awareness
or the awareness of what's happening
across the disaster-impactedarea is spotty.
Someone over here knows a little bit
about what's happening there,
and someone down here knows a little bit
about what's happening there.
But those first coupledays after the disaster,
there's a lot of sortof information gathering
(11:48):
and collecting that whole picture
of the situation of what's going on.
And having those relationshipsin place ahead of time
facilitates the transfer of information
a lot more seamlesslybecause you know who to call
and you know what their role is.
- With regard to that collaboration,
who are the folks who are...
Whether it's other academic institutions
(12:09):
or other organizations in general,
who are the folks that are doing...
Working on the same types ofthings that you're working on?
- I mean, at the state level,
there's the emergencymanagers at the state
and the government kindof works on some of this.
There's lots of industryassociations that talk to the state
and the federal players to make sure
(12:31):
that their voice is heard.
And some states havesimilar operations like that
where they try to bring in the key players
and maybe associationsthat can have a voice
for some of these key players
to have conversations around these things.
The American Logistics AidNetwork is also another group,
ALAN, that does this kind of work.
There's other universities
(12:52):
that think about these things too.
- And other nonprofitsthat are also involved
in various parts of the space.
- Yeah.
And then lots of differentparts of the government have
different views of it, right?
So if you think about theDepartment of Homeland Security,
they care a lot aboutphysical infrastructure
and so they kind of approach things
from a brick and mortar kindof point of view, right?
(13:15):
Whereas we're thinking about things
from a systemic supplychain kind of point of view,
which it's not always justabout where things are,
but it's how they operate.
So there's different people
looking at this from different angles.
- Well, and you've beenengaged and activated by FEMA
on occasion a number oftimes in recent years
during hurricane seasons.
What does that look like
(13:36):
when they come to youfor that kind of help?
- So we are activated to support FEMA
through the Supply Chain Analysis Network,
which is a group of supplychain professionals,
including us on the academic side.
And what we provide to FEMA
is almost like supply chainsituational awareness.
That's one of the things we provide.
(13:58):
So our role is to givea quick lay of the land
of how the private sector supply chains
are functioning or not,
and where government support could slot in
to help improve thespeed of the restoration
of private sector supply chains.
(14:19):
Because we realize thatthe government plays
a very important role after disasters
in getting services back to people,
getting goods back to people,
but they're a small drop in the bucket
in terms of the capacitythat the private sector has
to move food, water, fuel.
(14:40):
The private sector is doingthat day in and day out.
And so our role as partof SCAN is to understand
how the government can supportprivate sector recovery
because we recognize that,
that is really how most of the goods
and the things and theservices that people need
get back to them is restoringthe private sector operations.
(15:04):
So we provide that situationalawareness and just advice.
- And you've talkedabout bringing the public
and private sectors together in this area.
In general, what is that government's role
in disaster response?
How does it defer with whatthe private sector's role is
and how can each operate togetherfor this optimal response?
(15:25):
- The role of government isreally to fill those gaps
between what people's needs are
and what the privatesector, voluntary agencies,
what the collectivecommunity is able to provide.
That's the role of thegovernment is to fill that gap
(15:45):
and also to support where they can
in restoring thoseprivate sector operations.
But I think that in some areas,
there's also this niche role
for the government to play
in the really hard to reach areas
or the areas where itmight not be profitable
for the private sector to have a service
(16:08):
or have an operation.
That's where the government can step in
and be really useful interms of filling that gap.
So it might be buildinghomes in an island area
that's been impacted by a disaster,
but requires significantlogistical support
to get all the materials out there
(16:28):
and to support therebuilding of those homes.
FEMA has the role of coordinating
the federal governmentresponse to disasters.
Then you have down thegovernment spectrum,
you have the state governments,
which often have emergencymanagement functions
of their own,
whether it's part of thestate's Homeland Security office
(16:49):
or another office within the state.
They have an emergency management function
that works with the FEMA operation.
And then on down you have localgovernments that are really
the first line in termsof an emergency response,
in terms of coordinatingany type of response.
Any request for assistance goesup from the local government
(17:11):
to the state governmentto the federal government.
So anything that the local government
can't handle goes to the state.
And then anything that's abovethe state's capabilities,
they make a request tothe federal government.
So that's generally how thegovernment gets involved
in disaster response.
You have the federal coordinationthat supports the state
and local operations.
(17:32):
So that's sort of how it works.
But in terms of what thegovernment is responsible for,
the history of emergencyresponse in this country
starts a long time ago,
when we had disasters thatoverwhelmed individuals
and individual communities'ability to respond
and recover and help themselves.
(17:53):
So groups like the Red Cross emerged
to support a broader response.
And then in April of 1979,
FEMA was established by President Carter
to be sort of the nationalfederal coordinating body
for emergency response
because they recognized
(18:14):
that the disasters were getting worse,
they were impacting more people,
and it was overwhelmingindividual communities
and state's ability to respondand support themselves.
- I think what you wantare resilient communities
and you want communities that can respond,
but there will always bedisasters that overcome
(18:36):
the capability of thosecommunities to respond.
And then if it overcomes the capability
of the next sort of level of government,
whether it's a state or a county,
then you move on upand then there's a role
for centralized groups like governments
to be able to come in.
And if we even step back further
and we look across theworld and what the UN does,
(18:59):
when countries themselves are not able
to respond to a disaster,
that's when they caninvite in outside groups
like the UN to come in and help.
And so I think there's a rolefor both where you need to be
working to increase that local resilience
and to make communitiesbetter able to take care
of themselves in a disaster.
(19:20):
But you also have to havethis sort of backstop
for when there are disasters
that are way too bigfor anybody to handle.
- Well, it's interesting tome to hear about this idea
that the logistics of this
and the success of these responses
is based on long running cultural
and communal campaigns or feelings.
(19:43):
It's not just about,
oh, can we get 50 trucks tobring resources somewhere?
It's about managing communitiesof people to be able to come
together in effective ways.
- Yeah, and you see that constantly
and it's something that,
as I've been working in thisfield for 20 something years,
you haven't seen a drop off
in people wanting to help, right?
(20:03):
People wanna help, peoplewanna come do this work.
I mean, there's a reasonwhy there's the VOAD,
the National VoluntaryOrganizations Active in Disasters
that helps to communicateall of these organizations
that try to help people thatwant to help for disasters.
You can't separate disasterresponse from the communities,
from the people that just have this desire
(20:27):
to open their hearts andhelp people who are in need.
- Well, and you have some unique resources
here on the logistics sideof things, at MIT, at CTL.
I'm thinking of something likethe CAVE Lab for instance,
or the Computational Analytics,
Visualization & Education Lab.
Can you describe that a little bit
in terms of how that mightplay into disaster relief?
(20:50):
- What we do in the CAVELab is we do interactive
supply chain decisionsupport applications.
And by that I mean wedevelop applications to help
supply chain professionals andmaybe different stakeholders
come around a commonproblem and take decisions.
And so in a disaster,
what we have done is in blue sky times,
(21:11):
brought in differentstakeholders to look at a problem
and to talk about different policy levers
that could be pulled,
the benefits of those leversin terms of increasing
throughput of aid to those in need
and the private sector to talk about,
well, what are the cost ofthose and who should be either
bearing those costs or howcan we have incentives to help
(21:33):
make aid flow faster during a disaster
or make goods movefaster during a disaster?
And so the work we do inthe CAVE Lab is about having
some of these policyconversations and getting people
to understand the systembefore disaster hits.
It's really important tohave these conversations
and to make these plans and to invest
(21:54):
not just while it'shappening, but beforehand.
It's about helping to build the resilience
and doing some of thepreparation work, right?
During its search and rescue,
it's providing essential serviceslike food, water, shelter,
medical care, electricity,
getting these things back up and running.
After, it's about providingthat financial assistance
that Lauren was talkingabout to get people,
(22:16):
individuals and businesseswho've been affected
by a disaster to get themback up on their feet.
It's about providing someof these logistical supports
like debris clearance, things like that,
building back infrastructure
like roads that have been washed out
or bridges that were destroyed.
And it's about providing thatcoordination and communication
so that all these things canwork the best that they...
(22:37):
The most effectively that they can.
- A lot of what FEMA supportsis the recovery of individuals
and communities that don't have insurance,
that maybe didn't have a grocerystore before the disaster.
And so need additional supportin supporting the local food
bank to get the food suppliesback to those communities.
(22:59):
That's why the real sort oflong-term goal is increasing
the resilience of allcommunities so that any community
has the resources they need ahead of time
to respond to disasters.
Their individuals havehomeowner's insurance
or renter's insurance.
They have flood insurance.
- Outside of a FEMA,
what are some of the organizations
(23:19):
or who are some of the peopleor institutions or services
that are thinking about this stuff,
or sort of leaders in this thinking?
I'm thinking aboutorganizations like ALAN,
the American LogisticsAid Network, for instance.
- Yeah, so in addition tothe federal government,
and as Tim mentioned earlier,
there are a number of voluntary agencies
that are active in disasters.
(23:41):
And one in particular thatfocuses on the logistics side
of things is the AmericanLogistics Aid Network.
And ALAN really focuses
on how to support logistics operations.
So how to provide warehousing support,
transportation support for moving goods
from point A to point B,
(24:02):
how to basically take advantage of assets
that private sectororganizations are donating
in terms of warehousespace or trucks or drivers,
and use those to support theoverall disaster response.
There can be these very specific needs,
like we need to get thisspecific item from Puerto Rico
(24:24):
to the mainland or from themainland back to Puerto Rico,
like after Hurricane Maria.
And it may be too small for something
that the government can provide,
but too big for something thatanother agency can provide.
And ALAN has the abilityto work through its network
and find that kind of nichelogistics support that's needed.
(24:47):
- I don't wanna call any out
'cause there's just so many, right?
They all come together tohelp work during the disaster
and they take different roles,
whether it's helping withmass care or if it's feeding
or lots of different kinds of ways
that they involve themselves.
- When you're dealing onevery day with logistics,
(25:09):
surrounding things that havea stress of the urgency,
like a disaster, what getsyou out of bed in the morning?
What keeps you running?
- What gets me out of bed inthe morning is the ability
to think creatively
to solve problems thatcould ultimately help better
the experience of a disastersurvivor on their worst day.
(25:30):
It's really for me abouthow do I use the skills
and the knowledge thatI have to help people.
That's what gets me outof bed in the morning.
- Yeah, and I think like Lauren,I like to solve problems.
The challenge of answeringquestions that are hard
is really interesting andworking on humanitarian logistics
(25:50):
is complex, right?
There's lots of challenges to overcome.
And then on top of that,
it's just so crucial thatanything we can do to help
somebody that's in need,
to treat them withdignity and respect when,
like Lauren said, they're at their worst
or they're in their most need,
then it makes for a good day.
I guess the other thing that'sreally nice is coming to work
(26:11):
with the people that Iwork with is really nice.
You're surrounded by atalented, really smart,
dedicated people that are passionate
about trying to help others
and it's really great to cometo work and work with them.
- What's something thatyou're wishing I'm asking
that I haven't yet?
- So after HurricanesHarvey, Irma, and Maria,
(26:32):
in 2017, the lab was engagedin a national academy study
to provide recommendations
for strengthening supply chain resilience.
And we often turn backto those in disasters
that continue to happen,
as they continue to happen,and they remain relevant.
So I think I'll justtouch on them briefly here
because I think they'reuseful to understand.
(26:54):
So the first is shifting thefocus from pushing relief
supplies to restoringregular supply chains
as soon as possible.
And we've talked about thatthroughout this discussion
about it really being important to restore
those private sector supply chains,
those normal supply chainsas fast as possible,
because while the government has a role
in pushing that initial relief supplies
(27:17):
to fill that gap when theprivate sector may not be able to
operate as they normally would,
getting those back up is really important.
The second is strengtheningthe understanding
on the emergency management side
of their local supply chain.
So do you know as an emergency manager
where your closest fuel terminal is
(27:39):
and how the fuel gets from that terminal
to the retail stations in your area?
So really understandingthose local dynamics
because that's where if thereare impacts in a disaster,
that's the first placethey're gonna show up
in your community and the first place
they're gonna be an issue potentially.
The third is improving information sharing
(28:00):
and coordination acrosspublic and private.
And we talked about this alittle earlier in terms of
how do you establishthose communication lines
ahead of time?
And like Tim said, with the CAVE Lab,
that's a great example of how you practice
that information sharing.
Okay, you're in the CAVE Lab,
you're simulating a disaster,what are you gonna do?
(28:21):
What lever are you gonnapull, public sector,?
What does that mean foryou, private sector?
Oh, if you pull this lever, itactually makes my job harder.
So maybe don't pull that,
then maybe wait or maybe pull it earlier.
And then the fourth recommendationwas to provide training
to emergency managers onsupply chain dynamics.
So this kind of relatesto the second one about
strengthening understandingof the supply chains,
(28:42):
but really building that understanding
on the emergency managementside of supply chain dynamics.
How do bottlenecks emerge?
What do you do if a bottleneck emerges?
How do you think about relaxing
or what you can do to ease that bottleneck
to make sure that flow continues to move.
So really, that training is,
(29:02):
I think I mentioned it very early on,
is part of our role in thelab is that education piece
and educating the emergencymanagement community
both domestically andinternationally around supply chain
dynamics and how it works andwhat it means in a response.
- Yeah.
And we do that through anin-person class here at MIT
for master's students.
(29:23):
And we're about to launch a class on edX
in humanitarian logisticsthat anyone can sign up for.
And it's free to take the class
and there's a slightfee if you want to get
a certificate out of it.
- Well, thank you againfor joining us here today
on Supply Chain Frontiers,
brought to you by the MIT Center
for Transportation and Logistics,
celebrating its 50th year.
(29:43):
Again, I'm Benjy Kantor.
Today I've been joined byresearch engineer, Tim Russell,
and research associate, Lauren Finegan,
both of the Center'sHumanitarian Supply Chain Lab.
You can find more about thatlab at humanitarian.mit.edu.
Tim and Lauren,
thank you so much for joining us today.
In part two, I'm gonnarelinquish my hosting duties
(30:03):
to both Lauren and Tim asthey speak with Kathy Fulton
of the American Logistics Aid Network,
the executive director.
Thank you so much.
- Thanks, Benjy.- Thanks, Benjy.
(bright music)
- All right, everyone,thank you for listening.
I hope you've enjoyed this edition
of MIT Supply Chain Frontiers.
My name is Arthur Grau,
communications officer for the center.
And I invite you to visitus anytime at ctl.mit.edu,
(30:27):
or search for MIT Supply Chain Frontiers
on your favorite listening platform.
Until next time.
(bright music)
(bright music)
- Welcome to MIT Supply Chain Frontiers
from the MIT Center forTransportation and Logistics.
Each episode featurescenter researchers and staff
or experts from the fieldfor in-depth conversations
about business, education, and beyond.
- Welcome to today's episodeof Supply Chain Frontiers
brought to you by the MIT Center
for Transportation and Logistics.
(00:22):
I'm Benjy Kantor,
and today we're gonna betalking to Tim Russell
and Lauren Finegan of CTL'sHumanitarian Supply Chain Lab.
Tim, Lauren, nice to have you.
- Great to be here.
- Thanks for having us.
- The mission of the MITHumanitarian Supply Chain Lab
is to understand and improvethe supply chain systems behind
public services and privatemarkets to meet human needs.
Tim Russell, one of our two guests,
(00:43):
is a research engineer
at the MIT Humanitarian Supply Chain Lab.
He's worked on humanitarian supply chains
across the Caribbean, Latin America,
former Yugoslavia and East Africa.
Tim's also graduate of theMIT Supply Chain Management
masters program here at CTL.
And Lauren Finegan is a researchassociate here at the lab.
Lauren supports researchsponsored by government agencies
and promotes evidence-informedpolicy through outreach
(01:05):
with public and private stakeholders.
And she's also an MIT grad
having her intern master's intechnology and policy here.
So actually to start off,
I'd love to hear just a littlebit of general information
about Humanitarian Supply Chain Lab,
particularly with regardto disaster preparedness
and response work.
What are the kind of thingsthat you are working on?
- Thanks, Benjy.
So I guess I'll start maybewith a little bit of background
(01:29):
and just say that theHumanitarian Supply Chain Lab
was founded by Dr. Jarrod Goentzel.
After the 2010 earthquake in Haiti,
that's when he started focusingon this kind of full-time.
And so we work on a lotof different things,
but on the disaster side,
what we like to do is combine
several different fields like engineering
(01:51):
and supply chain management
and some social sciences and economics
and bring it all together
and try to understand what's going on
with the whole supply chainsystems around disasters.
- And, Lauren, what arethe most current things
that you're working on
and considerations thatyou have to be making
especially as we enter this season?
- Hurricane seasonofficially starts June 1st,
(02:13):
so we're well into hurricane season now.
I will say that the greatestactivity in hurricane season
usually isn't until theAugust-September timeframe,
and sometimes into October.
But the work that theHumanitarian Supply Chain Lab does
is part educational to sort of explain
(02:34):
supply chains in the disaster context
to emergency management audiences.
That's one key piece of what we do.
And we also do a lot ofresearch to understand
how supply chains adapt after disasters
to meet the needs of survivors.
(02:54):
So how does the private sector,
primarily private sectorsupply chain actors,
how do they adapt to make surethat grocery stores stay open
and that people can get the goods
that they need to recover from disasters?
So our research centersaround how that happens
and how the public sector,
(03:15):
agencies like FEMA andother agencies involved
in disaster response contribute to that
overall recovery of the supply chains.
- What is the quick rundownof disaster response?
Like disaster response 101?
What are the essential thingsthat people are hearing about
maybe in little pieces,
(03:37):
but that would have to do withhow supply chain is involved
and how integral it is to the process
of getting aid to places?
- My quick response to that is that,
I guess I'll share two examplesthat are probably recent
in people's minds about how
supply chain impacts disaster response.
One is the COVID-19 pandemic.
(03:59):
We all remember in the earlydays when you couldn't get
things like toilet paper,
and more critically asthe pandemic wore on,
how supplies like masks and 95 masks
and things like that weren't available.
And also how grocery storeshelves were under-stocked
(04:19):
as the people operating thesupply chain at various points
came down with COVID-19 andthe things couldn't move
as they normally wouldfor a variety of reasons.
Both the people,
the access in and out of different areas.
I know Tim has some experience studying
the freight supply chain after COVID-19
(04:41):
or during the COVID-19 pandemic,
and how that was impacted
by different restrictions of travel
in and out of different places.
The second example is notnecessarily a natural disaster
or a weather-related disaster,
but the colonial pipelineransomware attack.
(05:02):
So in May of 2019, therewas a ransomware attack
on the colonial pipeline.
And a ransomware attack,
how it works basicallyis hackers send a message
or something to an entity,
and they essentially hold hostage
a piece of your system
or data that's criticalin running your system.
(05:25):
They hold somethinghostage and ask for ransom,
a ransom payment in orderto release that data
or allow your system toreturn to normal functioning
to sort of get rid ofthe bug that has stopped
the functioning of your system.
And so that was the type of attack
that impacted the colonial pipeline.
The colonial pipeline precautionary
(05:46):
shut down pieces of its system,
which delayed the normaldelivery of fuel in some places,
but not for very long.
And again, as I mentioned earlier,
it was well within thestock that the terminals
along the pipeline hadto meet normal demand.
The issue arose when we saw panic buying
(06:08):
and runs on gas at the pumps.
And that was way above whatnormal demand would have been
had there been noindication of this issue.
That pipeline is part ofa larger fuel supply chain
and the spike in demand meant
that some gas stations were out of gas.
(06:28):
Now that was not necessarilybecause of a lack of supply.
There were was actuallyadequate supply in those areas
to meet normal demand,
but when we saw the sort of panic buying
and the spike in demand,that's when supplies ran out.
So I think those are twoexamples that kind of illustrate
(06:49):
for me at least the role thatsupply chains play oftentimes
in the background of getting people
the things they need in disasters,
and also the impact thatindividual decisions
like the decision for everyone
to go to the gas station at the same time,
and public policydecisions like the decision
for there to be travelrestrictions in and out of an area
(07:11):
or curfews have on the normaloperations of supply chains.
- When you don't know whenyou're gonna need to implement
some sort of disaster relief,
how do you activate allof the different parts
of the supply chain and logistics
so that, in aggregate, thingsget to where they need to be.
So for instance,
(07:32):
if the fuel gets halfway to Florida
when they're having some storms,they need additional fuel,
but there's no trucks totake it the rest of the way
or when the trucks are there,
but there's no driver totake it the rest of the way.
How do all the differentpieces get compiled together
and get activated
so that things get towhere they need to be?
- It's a good question, Benjy.
I mean Lauren kind of talkedabout this when she was talking
(07:54):
about how people respond to disasters,
and I think I'd like to take one step back
and kind of say that I think
when we're talking about disaster relief
in the United States,
it's more of making sure that the people
that have needs aregetting their needs met.
And it's not just a specific response,
(08:14):
but it's making sure that theprivate sector is working,
making sure that thegovernment can respond
and do search and rescue
and take care of thereally important needs
of the affected population,
like making sure that the hospitals are up
or making sure thatpeople in nursing homes
are taken care of,
making sure that foodand water are available
(08:35):
for people in shelters.
But when a disaster happens,
a lot of what's going onis the same sorts of things
that happen pre-disaster.
It's just you have to dealwith a lot of uncertainty
and not knowing often exactlywhere problems are happening,
where there's flooding,where roads are closed,
(08:56):
which places have powerso they can accept loads.
A lot of that sort of communication stuff
is part of what kind of needs to happen
from either business to business
or from the government to the public.
And so a lot of that coordinationeffort is kind of key to
making sure that thesupply chains keep moving
(09:16):
and moving ways that make sense.
- Is there a example of a success story
in so much as there can be a success story
in the wake of a disaster,
but success in terms of allthese pieces kind of coming
together and getting thingsto where they need to be?
- Yeah, I mean, we've seen over time,
states that respond to disasters often
(09:37):
are getting better at this sort of work.
And so I'll give you an example.
During Hurricane Ian,
category five storm thatcame ashore in Florida
near Fort Myers late September 2022,
caused lots of widespreaddamage across the state,
lots of flooding, winddamage, power outages.
But the state of Florida
(09:57):
and their Emergency Operation Center,
they stood up a call withthe fuel wholesalers.
And so these are the peoplethat go to the terminals
that have big stockpiles of fuel
and then they put itin their tanker trucks
and take it to gas stations, right?
And so there was work doneby the state to have a call
with these really key supplychain partners to understand
(10:21):
what terminals were up,
where they were having troublegetting access to terminals,
where they needed help
being able to get fuel to retail stations,
and just this little bit of coordination
enabled the response to flow much smoother
and to make sure that everybody knew
what was happening andwas on the same page.
(10:43):
And so just shining a lighton these things and having
people being able to have achance to talk to each other
and to be able to ask questionsthat on the next call,
the state can come back and answer,
that's a success story, right?
- Yeah.
And one thing I wanna addto what Tim said there
is what makes some of that so successful
is the relationships thatare managed and built
(11:06):
ahead of the disaster so thatthe state knows who to call,
and the private sectoroperators on the other side know
who to call at the state tofacilitate that coordination.
So it's building thoserelationships ahead of time that
really allows for that coordination
and that informationsharing when, as Tim said,
(11:27):
there's not a lot of...
Oftentimes there's thesituational awareness
or the awareness of what's happening
across the disaster-impactedarea is spotty.
Someone over here knows a little bit
about what's happening there,
and someone down here knows a little bit
about what's happening there.
But those first coupledays after the disaster,
there's a lot of sortof information gathering
(11:48):
and collecting that whole picture
of the situation of what's going on.
And having those relationshipsin place ahead of time
facilitates the transfer of information
a lot more seamlesslybecause you know who to call
and you know what their role is.
- With regard to that collaboration,
who are the folks who are...
Whether it's other academic institutions
(12:09):
or other organizations in general,
who are the folks that are doing...
Working on the same types ofthings that you're working on?
- I mean, at the state level,
there's the emergencymanagers at the state
and the government kindof works on some of this.
There's lots of industryassociations that talk to the state
and the federal players to make sure
(12:31):
that their voice is heard.
And some states havesimilar operations like that
where they try to bring in the key players
and maybe associationsthat can have a voice
for some of these key players
to have conversations around these things.
The American Logistics AidNetwork is also another group,
ALAN, that does this kind of work.
There's other universities
(12:52):
that think about these things too.
- And other nonprofitsthat are also involved
in various parts of the space.
- Yeah.
And then lots of differentparts of the government have
different views of it, right?
So if you think about theDepartment of Homeland Security,
they care a lot aboutphysical infrastructure
and so they kind of approach things
from a brick and mortar kindof point of view, right?
(13:15):
Whereas we're thinking about things
from a systemic supplychain kind of point of view,
which it's not always justabout where things are,
but it's how they operate.
So there's different people
looking at this from different angles.
- Well, and you've beenengaged and activated by FEMA
on occasion a number oftimes in recent years
during hurricane seasons.
What does that look like
(13:36):
when they come to youfor that kind of help?
- So we are activated to support FEMA
through the Supply Chain Analysis Network,
which is a group of supplychain professionals,
including us on the academic side.
And what we provide to FEMA
is almost like supply chainsituational awareness.
That's one of the things we provide.
(13:58):
So our role is to givea quick lay of the land
of how the private sector supply chains
are functioning or not,
and where government support could slot in
to help improve thespeed of the restoration
of private sector supply chains.
(14:19):
Because we realize thatthe government plays
a very important role after disasters
in getting services back to people,
getting goods back to people,
but they're a small drop in the bucket
in terms of the capacitythat the private sector has
to move food, water, fuel.
(14:40):
The private sector is doingthat day in and day out.
And so our role as partof SCAN is to understand
how the government can supportprivate sector recovery
because we recognize that,
that is really how most of the goods
and the things and theservices that people need
get back to them is restoringthe private sector operations.
(15:04):
So we provide that situationalawareness and just advice.
- And you've talkedabout bringing the public
and private sectors together in this area.
In general, what is that government's role
in disaster response?
How does it defer with whatthe private sector's role is
and how can each operate togetherfor this optimal response?
(15:25):
- The role of government isreally to fill those gaps
between what people's needs are
and what the privatesector, voluntary agencies,
what the collectivecommunity is able to provide.
That's the role of thegovernment is to fill that gap
(15:45):
and also to support where they can
in restoring thoseprivate sector operations.
But I think that in some areas,
there's also this niche role
for the government to play
in the really hard to reach areas
or the areas where itmight not be profitable
for the private sector to have a service
(16:08):
or have an operation.
That's where the government can step in
and be really useful interms of filling that gap.
So it might be buildinghomes in an island area
that's been impacted by a disaster,
but requires significantlogistical support
to get all the materials out there
(16:28):
and to support therebuilding of those homes.
FEMA has the role of coordinating
the federal governmentresponse to disasters.
Then you have down thegovernment spectrum,
you have the state governments,
which often have emergencymanagement functions
of their own,
whether it's part of thestate's Homeland Security office
(16:49):
or another office within the state.
They have an emergency management function
that works with the FEMA operation.
And then on down you have localgovernments that are really
the first line in termsof an emergency response,
in terms of coordinatingany type of response.
Any request for assistance goesup from the local government
(17:11):
to the state governmentto the federal government.
So anything that the local government
can't handle goes to the state.
And then anything that's abovethe state's capabilities,
they make a request tothe federal government.
So that's generally how thegovernment gets involved
in disaster response.
You have the federal coordinationthat supports the state
and local operations.
(17:32):
So that's sort of how it works.
But in terms of what thegovernment is responsible for,
the history of emergencyresponse in this country
starts a long time ago,
when we had disasters thatoverwhelmed individuals
and individual communities'ability to respond
and recover and help themselves.
(17:53):
So groups like the Red Cross emerged
to support a broader response.
And then in April of 1979,
FEMA was established by President Carter
to be sort of the nationalfederal coordinating body
for emergency response
because they recognized
(18:14):
that the disasters were getting worse,
they were impacting more people,
and it was overwhelmingindividual communities
and state's ability to respondand support themselves.
- I think what you wantare resilient communities
and you want communities that can respond,
but there will always bedisasters that overcome
(18:36):
the capability of thosecommunities to respond.
And then if it overcomes the capability
of the next sort of level of government,
whether it's a state or a county,
then you move on upand then there's a role
for centralized groups like governments
to be able to come in.
And if we even step back further
and we look across theworld and what the UN does,
(18:59):
when countries themselves are not able
to respond to a disaster,
that's when they caninvite in outside groups
like the UN to come in and help.
And so I think there's a rolefor both where you need to be
working to increase that local resilience
and to make communitiesbetter able to take care
of themselves in a disaster.
(19:20):
But you also have to havethis sort of backstop
for when there are disasters
that are way too bigfor anybody to handle.
- Well, it's interesting tome to hear about this idea
that the logistics of this
and the success of these responses
is based on long running cultural
and communal campaigns or feelings.
(19:43):
It's not just about,
oh, can we get 50 trucks tobring resources somewhere?
It's about managing communitiesof people to be able to come
together in effective ways.
- Yeah, and you see that constantly
and it's something that,
as I've been working in thisfield for 20 something years,
you haven't seen a drop off
in people wanting to help, right?
(20:03):
People wanna help, peoplewanna come do this work.
I mean, there's a reasonwhy there's the VOAD,
the National VoluntaryOrganizations Active in Disasters
that helps to communicateall of these organizations
that try to help people thatwant to help for disasters.
You can't separate disasterresponse from the communities,
from the people that just have this desire
(20:27):
to open their hearts andhelp people who are in need.
- Well, and you have some unique resources
here on the logistics sideof things, at MIT, at CTL.
I'm thinking of something likethe CAVE Lab for instance,
or the Computational Analytics,
Visualization & Education Lab.
Can you describe that a little bit
in terms of how that mightplay into disaster relief?
(20:50):
- What we do in the CAVELab is we do interactive
supply chain decisionsupport applications.
And by that I mean wedevelop applications to help
supply chain professionals andmaybe different stakeholders
come around a commonproblem and take decisions.
And so in a disaster,
what we have done is in blue sky times,
(21:11):
brought in differentstakeholders to look at a problem
and to talk about different policy levers
that could be pulled,
the benefits of those leversin terms of increasing
throughput of aid to those in need
and the private sector to talk about,
well, what are the cost ofthose and who should be either
bearing those costs or howcan we have incentives to help
(21:33):
make aid flow faster during a disaster
or make goods movefaster during a disaster?
And so the work we do inthe CAVE Lab is about having
some of these policyconversations and getting people
to understand the systembefore disaster hits.
It's really important tohave these conversations
and to make these plans and to invest
(21:54):
not just while it'shappening, but beforehand.
It's about helping to build the resilience
and doing some of thepreparation work, right?
During its search and rescue,
it's providing essential serviceslike food, water, shelter,
medical care, electricity,
getting these things back up and running.
After, it's about providingthat financial assistance
that Lauren was talkingabout to get people,
(22:16):
individuals and businesseswho've been affected
by a disaster to get themback up on their feet.
It's about providing someof these logistical supports
like debris clearance, things like that,
building back infrastructure
like roads that have been washed out
or bridges that were destroyed.
And it's about providing thatcoordination and communication
so that all these things canwork the best that they...
(22:37):
The most effectively that they can.
- A lot of what FEMA supportsis the recovery of individuals
and communities that don't have insurance,
that maybe didn't have a grocerystore before the disaster.
And so need additional supportin supporting the local food
bank to get the food suppliesback to those communities.
(22:59):
That's why the real sort oflong-term goal is increasing
the resilience of allcommunities so that any community
has the resources they need ahead of time
to respond to disasters.
Their individuals havehomeowner's insurance
or renter's insurance.
They have flood insurance.
- Outside of a FEMA,
what are some of the organizations
(23:19):
or who are some of the peopleor institutions or services
that are thinking about this stuff,
or sort of leaders in this thinking?
I'm thinking aboutorganizations like ALAN,
the American LogisticsAid Network, for instance.
- Yeah, so in addition tothe federal government,
and as Tim mentioned earlier,
there are a number of voluntary agencies
that are active in disasters.
(23:41):
And one in particular thatfocuses on the logistics side
of things is the AmericanLogistics Aid Network.
And ALAN really focuses
on how to support logistics operations.
So how to provide warehousing support,
transportation support for moving goods
from point A to point B,
(24:02):
how to basically take advantage of assets
that private sectororganizations are donating
in terms of warehousespace or trucks or drivers,
and use those to support theoverall disaster response.
There can be these very specific needs,
like we need to get thisspecific item from Puerto Rico
(24:24):
to the mainland or from themainland back to Puerto Rico,
like after Hurricane Maria.
And it may be too small for something
that the government can provide,
but too big for something thatanother agency can provide.
And ALAN has the abilityto work through its network
and find that kind of nichelogistics support that's needed.
(24:47):
- I don't wanna call any out
'cause there's just so many, right?
They all come together tohelp work during the disaster
and they take different roles,
whether it's helping withmass care or if it's feeding
or lots of different kinds of ways
that they involve themselves.
- When you're dealing onevery day with logistics,
(25:09):
surrounding things that havea stress of the urgency,
like a disaster, what getsyou out of bed in the morning?
What keeps you running?
- What gets me out of bed inthe morning is the ability
to think creatively
to solve problems thatcould ultimately help better
the experience of a disastersurvivor on their worst day.
(25:30):
It's really for me abouthow do I use the skills
and the knowledge thatI have to help people.
That's what gets me outof bed in the morning.
- Yeah, and I think like Lauren,I like to solve problems.
The challenge of answeringquestions that are hard
is really interesting andworking on humanitarian logistics
(25:50):
is complex, right?
There's lots of challenges to overcome.
And then on top of that,
it's just so crucial thatanything we can do to help
somebody that's in need,
to treat them withdignity and respect when,
like Lauren said, they're at their worst
or they're in their most need,
then it makes for a good day.
I guess the other thing that'sreally nice is coming to work
(26:11):
with the people that Iwork with is really nice.
You're surrounded by atalented, really smart,
dedicated people that are passionate
about trying to help others
and it's really great to cometo work and work with them.
- What's something thatyou're wishing I'm asking
that I haven't yet?
- So after HurricanesHarvey, Irma, and Maria,
(26:32):
in 2017, the lab was engagedin a national academy study
to provide recommendations
for strengthening supply chain resilience.
And we often turn backto those in disasters
that continue to happen,
as they continue to happen,and they remain relevant.
So I think I'll justtouch on them briefly here
because I think they'reuseful to understand.
(26:54):
So the first is shifting thefocus from pushing relief
supplies to restoringregular supply chains
as soon as possible.
And we've talked about thatthroughout this discussion
about it really being important to restore
those private sector supply chains,
those normal supply chainsas fast as possible,
because while the government has a role
in pushing that initial relief supplies
(27:17):
to fill that gap when theprivate sector may not be able to
operate as they normally would,
getting those back up is really important.
The second is strengtheningthe understanding
on the emergency management side
of their local supply chain.
So do you know as an emergency manager
where your closest fuel terminal is
(27:39):
and how the fuel gets from that terminal
to the retail stations in your area?
So really understandingthose local dynamics
because that's where if thereare impacts in a disaster,
that's the first placethey're gonna show up
in your community and the first place
they're gonna be an issue potentially.
The third is improving information sharing
(28:00):
and coordination acrosspublic and private.
And we talked about this alittle earlier in terms of
how do you establishthose communication lines
ahead of time?
And like Tim said, with the CAVE Lab,
that's a great example of how you practice
that information sharing.
Okay, you're in the CAVE Lab,
you're simulating a disaster,what are you gonna do?
(28:21):
What lever are you gonnapull, public sector,?
What does that mean foryou, private sector?
Oh, if you pull this lever, itactually makes my job harder.
So maybe don't pull that,
then maybe wait or maybe pull it earlier.
And then the fourth recommendationwas to provide training
to emergency managers onsupply chain dynamics.
So this kind of relatesto the second one about
strengthening understandingof the supply chains,
(28:42):
but really building that understanding
on the emergency managementside of supply chain dynamics.
How do bottlenecks emerge?
What do you do if a bottleneck emerges?
How do you think about relaxing
or what you can do to ease that bottleneck
to make sure that flow continues to move.
So really, that training is,
(29:02):
I think I mentioned it very early on,
is part of our role in thelab is that education piece
and educating the emergencymanagement community
both domestically andinternationally around supply chain
dynamics and how it works andwhat it means in a response.
- Yeah.
And we do that through anin-person class here at MIT
for master's students.
(29:23):
And we're about to launch a class on edX
in humanitarian logisticsthat anyone can sign up for.
And it's free to take the class
and there's a slightfee if you want to get
a certificate out of it.
- Well, thank you againfor joining us here today
on Supply Chain Frontiers,
brought to you by the MIT Center
for Transportation and Logistics,
celebrating its 50th year.
(29:43):
Again, I'm Benjy Kantor.
Today I've been joined byresearch engineer, Tim Russell,
and research associate, Lauren Finegan,
both of the Center'sHumanitarian Supply Chain Lab.
You can find more about thatlab at humanitarian.mit.edu.
Tim and Lauren,
thank you so much for joining us today.
In part two, I'm gonnarelinquish my hosting duties
(30:03):
to both Lauren and Tim asthey speak with Kathy Fulton
of the American Logistics Aid Network,
the executive director.
Thank you so much.
- Thanks, Benjy.- Thanks, Benjy.
(bright music)
- All right, everyone,thank you for listening.
I hope you've enjoyed this edition
of MIT Supply Chain Frontiers.
My name is Arthur Grau,
communications officer for the center.
And I invite you to visitus anytime at ctl.mit.edu,
(30:27):
or search for MIT Supply Chain Frontiers
on your favorite listening platform.
Until next time.
(bright music)
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