◎ Hao Zhangcheng

“Introduction of logistics concept of bag-to-bag transfer of carbon black may become the first choice for tire enterprises to decrease the cost and increase the efficiency and satisfy the environmental protection requirements.” Li Jianjun, president of Dagu Logistics Co., Ltd., said when receiving the interview of the journalist lately.

Lately, upon the invitation of President Li Jianjun, the journalist visited Dagu Logistics Co., Ltd. Hefei Branch which specialized in bag-to-bag transfer of carbon black for Continental Tires (China) Co., Ltd., and interviewed this celebrity in Dalian sea transportation industry who had served as Grade A Class 1 captain of ocean-going ship for ten years and served as general manager of sea transportation enterprise for ten years to learn about how he became the one practising and promoting the concept of bag-to-bag transfer of carbon black.

Professional Persons Do Professional Things

Logistics industry is considered as the artery and basic industry of national economic development, its development degree has become one of the important marks for measuring the modern degree and comprehensive national power of one country, in which “third party logistics” has become the mainstream for development of logistics industry in the 21st century.

The so-called third party logistics is a form that the third party logistics enterprises undertake logistics activities of the enterprises, it neither possesses the commodities nor participates in purchase and sale of the commodities, its commodities are “logistics services” carried out in cooperation with the first party consignors or second party consignees.

Li Jianjun said, as logistics activities became increasingly huge and complex, the organization and operation mode of first party and second party logistics could not completely satisfy the social needs. Meanwhile, to participate in global competition, improve the core competitiveness, enhance supply chain management and lower the logistics cost, international and multinational companies were keen on outsourcing the logistics activities not belonging to the core business. Therefore, the third party logistics came into being.

Bag-to-bag transfer of carbon black is an important pattern of manifestation of third party logistics. It was introduced to China by Dalian Goodyear Tire Company in the “11th Five-Year” period, when Dalian Goodyear was carrying out the environmental protection relocation project from the urban area to Pulandian Bay New Area. By chance, Li Jianjun contacted this concept and he has been engaged in and promoting this industry for 10 years since then. 

Li Jianjun said, the so-called bag-to-bag transfer of carbon black meant that the fabc bag carbon black (1 ton/bag, which was called “container bag”) of the consignor’s carbon black factory was delivered to the warehouse of the third party Dagu Logistics instead of being directly delivered to the tire factory of the consignee, and then Dagu Logistics unpacked and changed the bag of corresponding specification according to the instructions of the tire company, and transferred to the large storage tank of the tire factory with carbon black lorry. 

In 2010, Dagu Logistics carried out bag-to-bag transfer of carbon black business for Dalian Goodyear, most of whose products needed sea transportation, and Dagu Logistics, as a professional shipping enterprise, possessed unique advantage of sea transportation resources and could provide sail scheduling, space booking, documents, customs clearance, declaration for inspection and quarantine, etc. of imported and exported goods. After the carbon black products were delivered to the wharf, Dagu Logistics transported the containers from the wharf to the carbon black bag-to-bag station for storage and transfer.

Bag-to-bag transfer of carbon black requires tank truck, Dagu Logistics found across China and found that Yangzhou CIMC Company could manufacture tank truck, but this company never made the tank truck conforming to this special requirement and finally took great pains to satisfy the requirements of the tire factory, both parties joined in hands to successfully manufacture the first professional carbon black tank truck in China.
However, given then manufacturing technology, the storage capacity of the tank truck was small, along with development of tank manufacturing technology, the tanks with a larger capacity gradually appear, at present, Dagu Logistics is the first enterprise trying the tank with a capac-ity of 55m³ in China.

Li Jianjun expressed that: “one might have learned the doctrine earlier than the other, or might be a master in his own special field”, people often said that “professional persons do professional things” in modern society, the progress of the mankind is creating huge and growing social wealth by specialization of work. “With the professional and scaled combined advantage of sea transportation and land transportation as well as nearly 10 years of experience in door-to-door service of European and American enterprises, we are willing to play our proper role in sharing the enterprise risks, lowering the operation costs and improving the enterprise competitiveness for the tire industry under the circumstances where the cost of the tire industry is high.”

Greeting Specialization with An Open Mind

Li Jianjun introduced the journalist the conditions of the bag-to-bag transfer of carbon black industry in EU countries investigated by him, where such business had developed very mature, and the logistics enterprises had huge scale and capacity. Although it takes time for domestic tire industry to accept new things and change mind, considering the functions of solving the environmental protection problem of carbon black dust and lowering the cost and improving the economic benefits, Li Jianjun thought that domestic tire industry surely would become the beneficiary of bag-to-bag transfer of carbon black, and after some time, bag-to-bag transfer of carbon black would be achieved without extra efforts and have a good development prospect in China.

When investigating one enterprise of bag-to-bag transfer of carbon black in Poland, Li Jianjun learned that the environmental protection requirements of Europe were extremely strict, the station for bag-to-bag transfer of carbon black could only be built in some eastern European countries such as Poland, which could not only connect with the countries in Northern Europe and Central and Western Europe seamlessly, but also solve the local environmental protection problem. This enterprise possessed over 100 large tank trucks, which distributed and transferred the carbon black to all Europe constantly each day.

European and American tire enterprises such as Goodyear and Continental adopted bag-to-bag transfer of carbon black, after layout in China, they brought about this concept and method to China spontaneously. In June 2017, Dagu Logistics signed the contract for bag-to-bag transfer of carbon black business with the second employer Continental China Co., Ltd.

However, when discussing the third party logistics business with domestic-funded tire enterprises, Li Jianjun learned about that the management of tire enterprises worried about what to do if there was quality problem if out-sourcing storage and quality management of carbon black without self control?

In this point, overseas-funded enterprises were open-minded and generally had no such worry. With the current trend of economic globalization, overseas-funded enterprises sought maximum profit and saving of design expenses and floor area of storage and transportation project with minimum inventory and input at all times. Storage of carbon black in other warehouses exempted them from storage expenses and quality risks. Li Jianjun said, as international famous enterprises, how could they leave the products of the supplier alone? For example, the tire factory of Continental would periodically inspect the quality system operation conditions, safety production conditions and goods storage conditions of Dagu Logistics and carry out at least two inspections of the products of each batch and each tank. In addition, these transnational companies promoted group purchase, they had factories all over the world, promotion of bag-to-bag transfer of carbon black had many benefits.

Most of domestic tire enterprises were monomer factory seeking for being large and comprehensive. They did not know the expenses of the links such as storage, warehouse management, handling, independent bag-to-bag transfer as well as labor cost might not necessarily be lower than that of professional logistics companies. In addition, from internal management, too many personnel and links were difficult to be monitored, and the conditions of losing control and absence might easily occur, especially in the aspect of environmental health. When visiting some enterprises, Li Jianjun saw that at present, in domestic general tire factories, independent bag-to-bag transfer of carbon black generally caused too much dust and dirty ground on the operation site, thus further affecting the environmental health of the whole raw material warehouse and environmental protection of the whole enterprise. However, after transportation with tank trucks was implemented, those problems could be avoided. As the factories built by partial enterprises along the “Belt and Road” increased and the logistics line became longer and longer, such fund consciousness and professional operation mode should be enhanced, otherwise, it would be difficult to become a real whole industry chain transnational enterprise.

Li Jianjun said, bag-to-bag transfer of carbon black basically would not increase much cost for the enterprises and might be reduced in the long run, therefore, the tire enterprises should greet specialization with an open mind.

Providing the Customers with Value-added Services with Consciousness for the Best

In the parking lost of Dagu Hefei Branch, the journalist saw the tank truck marked with the logo of Continental. Li Jianjun pointed at the yellow giant and said, this was the tank truck customized for Continental, at present, there were 4 in total, each of which had a capacity of 55m3 and a freight volume of about 20 tons. Overseas-funded enterprises were particular with the brand image, to make the ground color of the tank completely same with the color of the LOGO of Continental, Dagu Logistics made it after multiple matching.

The journalist saw that the tank truck was clearly marked with the information such as carbon black model and capacity. Li Jianjun said that Dagu Logistics insisted on special tank for special use, without mixing. 

The journalist deeply learned about the working process of bag-to-bag transfer. The main project of Dagu Logistics was divided into two parts, storage warehouse and tanking operation platform. After being delivered to the storage warehouse of Dagu Logistics, the carbon black purchased by Continental Hefei Factory was unloaded with forklift for temporary storage and pending packaging. Upon receiving the instructions of the tire factory, Dagu Logistics would lift the fibc bag of the required specification to the tanking operation platform with traveling crane and then unpack the fibc bag, subpackage to the tank trucks through four feeder noses and then deliver to Continental Hefei Factory. The journalist observed on the tanking site that the production process and operation flow of Dagu Logistics were designed to be practical and exquisite, Dagu Logistics prepared to apply for national patent for those gems of wisdom.

For example, Dagu Logistics carried out local transformation of the tank truck according to its own needs, there were 4 material collection noses and vents on the top of the truck, which corresponded with 4 feeder noses and tanking equipment, to avoid the flying of the carbon black at the time of unloading, all of them were designed as vacuum double-layer structure, with pores on the internal wall, and 3 dedusting devices and 3 vacuum devices were installed. Sampling mouth was additionally installed in the rear of the tank, the products would undergo second quality sampling and testing before entering the factory to be poured into the tank. Dagu Logistics applied the hydraulic rod of tank truck of the first brand in China, the lifting angle of the hydraulic rod could reach 60°, and only 40  minutes were required to unload 20 tons of carbon black in one truck.

In the aspect of carbon black dust control, occupational health management and facility investment, Dagu Logistics was unequivocal. During the project review organized by the Environmental Protection Bureau of Hefei High-tech Zone, it passed the review for once, various indexes completely conformed to the industrial positioning requirements of the park where it was and would not reduce the quality of atmospheric environment of the region where it was.

During subpackaging of carbon black, the carbon black dust generated by the tanking funnel and vent holes of tank truck was collected to 1# and 2# bag type dust collectors by negative pressure in an organized way with fan through the channel, with the collection efficiency reaching 98%. Then the dust was emitted with the same exhaust funnel of 15-meter high. Both the concentration and speed of organized emission of carbon black dust were lower than the standard, which satisfied the limit requirements of Integrated Emission Standard of Air Pollutants (GB 16297-1996).

Dagu Logistics created first-rate industrial quality with meticulous and precise manufacturing attitude, in the tanking link, tanking could be carried out only after three parties, duty manager, warehouse personnel and operation monitor, signed on the site and the manufacturer, model and batch No. conformed to the instructions. Now they added another error prevention and correction process, only when the bar code on the tank truck matched the bar code of fibc bag, the computer would instruct the traveling crane to carry out the next operation, otherwise, the traveling crane would not move.
Such management and service mode of Dagu Logistics had been praised by its cooperative tire factories as a model of lowering costs, which provided good experience reference for tire factories to realize resource recycling, energy conservation and emission reduction, efficiency improvement and green and intelligent manufacturing in the whole supply chain.

“As a third party logistics enterprise, Dagu Logistics could not compare with tire enterprises in the scale. However, Dagu Logistics is more professional and has accumulated rich experience during the process of serving the enterprises ranking 3rd and 4th in Fortune Top 75. Large tire enterprises need several professional companies such as Dagu Logistics to provide supporting services so as to carry out the tire business absorbedly. Dagu Logistics is willing to provide more added value for the tire customers through its service with its professionalism and experience and display the true core value of ‘third party logistics’.” Li Jianjun finally expressed.