AUSTRALIA: The government has released a ‘refreshed’ National Freight & Supply Chain Strategy, updating its 2019 strategy to take into account the impact of Covid-19, geopolitical shifts, extreme weather events and worker shortages.
The document identifies four priority areas: Productivity, Resilience, Decarbonisation and Data.
Proposed actions include:
- developing a national freight resilience plan to ensure a co-ordinated response to significant supply chain disruptions;
- developing a freight infrastructure investment framework;
- conducting safety research on batteries and zero emission power technologies for freight vehicles and locomotives;
- modelling the current and future freight and supply chain network to consider what is needed to support its efficiency and effectiveness into the future.
Welcoming the publication of the strategy, Australasian Railway Association CEO Caroline Wilkie said the freight sector was ’at a critical juncture, with an urgent need for greater use of rail to create a more productive and sustainable national freight network that meets Australia’s future needs’.
