What Is the Difference Between Cold Chain and Ordinary Logistics?

The scope of application of cold chain logistics includes primary agricultural products such as vegetables, fruits, meat, poultry, eggs, aquatic products, flower products, frozen food, ice cream and dairy products, chocolate and so on. It has higher requirements and more complex than the general normal temperature logistics system, and the construction investment is also much larger, which is a huge system engineering.

Compared with normal temperature logistics, the main difference of cold chain logistics is that it needs to keep a low temperature, needs the whole process of the cold chain, involves more disciplines, more complicated management, and higher cost.

Cold chain logistics has special requirements in terms of time, quality, temperature, humidity and sanitary environment, and the operation is more complex, with three main characteristics as below.

1. Timeliness

Since the products carried by cold chain logistics are generally perishable or difficult to store, it is required that cold chain logistics must complete operations quickly to ensure timeliness.

2. Complexity

Compared with normal temperature logistics, cold chain logistics involves technologies such as refrigeration technology, heat preservation technology, temperature and humidity detection, information system and product change mechanism research, and some products even involve the constraints of laws and regulations, and each product has its corresponding. If the temperature, humidity and storage time requirements are high, once the chain is broken, the previous efforts will be in vain, thus greatly increasing the complexity of cold chain logistics.

3. High cost

The cost of cold chain logistics is much higher than that of normal temperature logistics. The first is the high cost of equipment. The cost of cold chain logistics center warehouses and cold chain vehicles is generally several times that of normal temperature warehouses and vehicles, and because food and other special facilities and equipment are required, a large amount of capital investment is required; secondly, the operating cost of cold chain logistics is high, and the cold storage needs to be continuously cooled to ensure the temperature is in a constant state, resulting in a high electricity cost of the cold storage. Refrigerated trucks also need to be continuously cooled to ensure a constant temperature of the product, which requires more fuel costs. The capital recovery period of cold chain logistics is long, which cannot be afforded by ordinary enterprises.

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