The first-ever European logistics summit saw businesses release a declaration committing them to raising understanding of the importance of efficient logistics for the EU's competitiveness and decoupling the sector's growth from its environmental impact.
They also said a European logistics platform would be created in 2009, calling on other interested actors to join the venture to help prepare a "logistics workplan" for the next European Commission, which is set to take office in autumn 2009.
Business also called on the EU executive to establish a High Level Stakeholder Group on Logistics to consider the future of the sector. However, John Berry, a Commission official from the logistics and intelligent transport unit, poured cold water on such ambitions.
Berry noted that while the Commission and business alike are both well-positioned to deal with the logistics issue, member states and the civil sector do not meet this standard. "We need to profile logistics higher on the agenda and raise visibility," he said.
A representative of Deutsche Post World Net argued that perhaps the Commission could provide the kind of support and attention for logistics sector and industry as it did for the ICT sector at the end of 1990s to boost development and innovation in that field.
MEP Malcolm Harbour agreed that "much clearer" consensus between member states and EU policymakers should be reached on issues affecting logistics, including pricing, taxing of vehicles and building of new infrastructure. He also stressed the need for the public sector to drive demand for greener logistics (see EurActiv LinksDossier). Meanwhile, businesses should seize upon the branding opportunity presented by corporate social responsibilty policies for green transport and logistics, he added.
"We need to concentrate on what we have and make the best use of it," said Zoltan Kazatsay, deputy director general of the Commission's directorate general for transport and energy. He notes that building new infrastructure is expensive and cannot solve problems like congestion alone. "We need to improve the functioning of the single market, cut more red tape and eliminate protectionsim," while "logistics software will be the key for the future," he concluded.
According to Georg Wellinghoff, senior vice president of BASF global procurement and logistics, more investment is needed in transport management systems to efficiently merge different transport modes. He also argued that no competition between different modes should exist as "at the end of the day we need all of them".
