Long hual trucking is going through a transformation phase, lot of new things are happening. There are changes at behavior and technological level, all these were covered in story by Logistics_insider magazine, where our Executive director Mr. Aditya Shah, shared his thoughts on the subject. Read the article with below link.

1. Logistics Insider October 201938
The long-haul trucking segment is often dotted with challenges like shortage
of drivers, idle time, working capital finance and several others which hinder
the growth of the overall trucking sector. Presently, total billable days of a long
haul truck lingers between 12 to 17 days but a better optimised network can
increase it up to 24 days and can push revenue 40% to 60% more.
Mrinmoy Kalita
L K
C L O S E R
FEATURE LONG HAUL TRUCKING
AT INDIA’S LONG HAUL
TRUCKING MARKET

2. www.logisticsinsider.in 39
T
he long
haul
trucking
industry
in India is
growing
at a rapid
pace, that too at a rate
faster than the country’s
economy. Growing at a
staggering rate of 15% per
annum, the overall trucking
industry of India is taking
the current total number
to over 2,000 trucks per
million populations. Besides,
the utilisation of trucks has
become around 80,000 km
per year.
The government’s attention
of late is making the
sector more attractive for
equity players and tech
startups, resulting in vibrant
ecosystems of new entrants
challenging the status quo.
However, one must agree
that even today, the
trucking sector of India is
highly unorganised and
needs to be nurtured
properly. But with the
integration of technology
and its advancements, it has
reached today’s blissful state
and is poised for an even
better tomorrow.
According to Aditya Shah,
Executive Director, V-Trans,
“In the past decade or so,
the industry has witnessed
a major makeover. This is
largely characterized by the
industry moving from being
unorganized to an organized
one; though a lot of things
are still in the process of
changing. The truck loading
capacity has been increased
significantly; consciousness
amongst the industry players
towards environment has
very much increased.”
The Touch Of Technology
Technology has been acting
as a process enabler in long
haul trucking. It helps in
increasing the overall ease
of doing business for the
companies. In India, the long
haul trucking companies
are using technology in 3
primary areas - Monitoring,
Track&Trace, and
Communication.
Venu Kondur, CEO, LOBB
said, “Technology is
changing the total landscape
of long haul transportation
from discovery of load, track
& trace of shipment in real-
time, to real-time updates to
all the stakeholders. Indian
digital revolution is helping
truckers to plan effectively to
save delivery time & money.”
With the help of online
platforms, the truck owners
are able to find and bid for
shipping assignments with
ease. Besides, the real time
demand aggregation and
pricing transparency reduce
the dependency on brokers.
According to Shah, “The
online payment for fuel
supply has been of good
help to stay away from the
worry of carrying a lot of
cash in trucks, more so in
post demonization era.
Technology has helped in
higher productivity, shorter
travel time, sensors and
telematics, reduced fuel
pilferage and accidents,
and digital documents over
phone.”
Moreover, Predictive
Analytics for Route
Plan, Forward Looking
Cameras Systems, Driver
Scorecards, Collision
Mitigation Technology,
Electronic Logging Devices,
Trailer Tracking, IoT, AI for
Discovery of Trucks, ML for
Price Discovery and Cloud
Based B2B marketplace
are some current ongoing
technologies that are
revolutionising the long haul
trucking market.
Overcoming The
Challenges
The long haul segment
has always been dotted
www.logisticsinsider.in 39
FEATURELONG HAUL TRUCKING
Growing at a
staggering rate of
15% per annum,
the overall trucking
industry of India is
taking the current
total number to over
2,000 trucks per
million populations.

3. Logistics Insider October 201940
by challenges because of
its unpredictable nature.
And these challenges have
been obscuring the growth
of the overall trucking
segment. The sector carrying
majority of the freight of the
country has been through a
distressing phase of late.
The primary challenges
faced by the long haul
segment are:
• Driver’s shortage due to the
lack of social security
• Poor infrastructure of the
roads
• Backhaul or idle time
• Lack of proper pit stops
• Working capital financing
The Problem Of Driver’s
Shortage
The job of a truck driver in
India has always been looked
down upon by the society.
This job is one of the least
respected, not only in India
but also across the globe.
Besides, the average salary
of a truck driver India is
about INR 22,000 – `30,000
per month, while a taxi
driver earns about `40,000 –
`45,000 per month.
The lack of social security and
non-standardised remuneration
of the truck drivers have been
leading to the shortage of
drivers in this sector. Currently,
around 28% of approximately
8.5 million trucks on the road
are stuck due to the drivers’
crisis situation.
Venu Kondur, pointing out
the alarming condition
said, “Trucking is important
and is the backbone of the
economy, but it is facing
acute shortage of drivers
and young generation is
not coming forward to take
up driver’s job due to many
reasons like tough driving
conditions, out of home for
many days, harassment from
officials, unknown people
and areas etc.”
According to a research, 53%
of drivers suffer from some
health issues while 23%
battle lack of sleep, around
18% face physical stress and
12% face mental stress.
A financial loss of about USD
60 billion per year has been
estimated because of the
shortage of truck drivers in
India.
To overcome the issue
of drivers’ shortage, the
Government needs to make
policy decisions to attract
youth to take up drivers’
jobs. Schemes like insurance
for families of drivers, free
education for kids, better
road-side facility to uplift
driver’s lifestyle etc. should
be introduced.
Most importantly, the
Government should
setup skill programs for
transportation across Pan
India and provide training
and certification courses to
fulfil job requirements in the
logistics sector.
The idle time and handling
the revenue lost
While transporting freights
from one place to another
by a truck, the truck might
not necessarily get freights in
its return journey. This leads
to generation of idle time.
A loss of revenue occurs
because of lower utilisation
of assets due to the idle time.
As added by Mr Shah,
revenue lost due to idle
“Digitization and less uses
of cash has been a big area
where there is momentous
transformation is taking place.
Transit times have reduced
tremendously and there is
much higher accountability and
transparency.”
ADITYA SHAH
Executive Director, V-Trans
FEATURE LONG HAUL TRUCKING