Audit Report: Supply Chain Inefficiencies

Heres part of my most recent completed research paper on the supply chain, more to follow later.
Introduction:
JIT delivery as an effective, efficient, and economical segment of the supply chain is doomed to become technologically infeasible, and economically unpractical. One often thinks of JIT delivery as an efficient method at which goods are delivered and manufactured at exceptional quality. Anthony Dear in his literary work Working Towards Just-In-Time defines[1] JIT delivery as “materials and goods arriving just-in-time to be used for manufacturing or being dispatched to a customer”. However, various newspapers and periodicals entitle it JIT transport choosing to clearly delineate it to the supply chain. The focus of the future of JIT delivery is not on the efficient use of inventory or the increased quality of the product but on the supply chain aspect itself. Without the effective and efficient supply chain JIT is left with only inventory, minimization and total quality management (although others argue that these in themselves are there own disciplines). JIT delivery is adversely impacted by external environmental circumstances such as inefficiencies in the transportation of goods, oil prices, and border delays resulting from terrorism, unions, and capacity problems with the supply chain. One must discuss the historical circumstances that has lead JIT delivery to its present situation, in order to evaluate the external problems and determine solutions that are needed. If these external circumstances are not resolved, they will result in JIT transports ultimate collapse.
Origin of the Problem
JIT first began in Japan after the Second World War. After the bombings of the Japanese industry there were very little buildings to house manufacturing plants as one roomed facilities was all that could be found to conduct manufacturing operations and for storage of the inventory needed to carry on the day-to-day operations. The system of JIT was utilized out of a need for economic survival. The 1950’s Japanese manufactures did not realize that they had just made a more advanced system of logistics were goods could be manufactured more efficiently, effectively and economically. JIT delivery appears to be one of the good aspects that emerged as a direct consequence of the Second World War. The system of the supply chain has been greatly advanced because of JIT delivery in several key aspects including the following: increase inventory usage (inventory turnover), increased efficiency as receiving supplies only when needed has resulted in companies being more efficient with their human and machine capital leading to increased quality through total quality management. The creation of JIT delivery minimized the impacts of high holding and warehouse related input costs. Corporations in North America have saved hundreds of millions of dollars over the last forty-five years and are in danger of loosing their long-term investment in the supply chain due to several macro environmental impacts. These external problems can be summarized to include increased fuel prices and inefficiencies among different segments of the supply value chain. The previous mentioned advantages that derived directly from lack of inventory space has resulted in minimized raw material and increased quality. Wen-Yu Yang[2] in his article The Design of the Factory With a Future defines JIT’s internal factory purpose as “attempt to change the manufacturing process to eliminate non-value-added activities”. The elimination of waste of raw materials has increased internal efficiency with the company’s outputs per unit of raw material. However, it is a shame that external inefficiencies in the supply chain mentioned in subsequent paragraphs exist counter intuitive to Just-in-times original purpose of efficiency.
Without JIT –delivery coming to the United States after the Second World War the inventory usage and quality control advances in technology might not have occurred as the Henry Ford mentality of increased efficiency and quality was no longer the center of attention during the Cold War struggles. JIT-delivery also leads to a military aspect, which gave the American military a distinctive advantage over the Soviet Union during the Cold War. The history and advantages to JIT-delivery helped move the theory into reality, however with any reality there also comes trials and various circumstances that bring the theory to the brink of economic and social collapse. The following disadvantages and corresponding solutions will acknowledge that JIT delivery is presently experiencing the adverse consequences of the macro environment that must either be solved or bring the theory crashing down to be substitute by some sci-fi method of delivery.
[1]
[2] Yang, Wen-Yu. Common Wealth April issue 1996. McGraw-Hill Series in Industrial Engineering and Managment