A proposal of Reverse Logistics applied in Humanitarian Relief Actions : Donations   Identification and Reallocation – A Humanitarian Logistics View

Sammanfattning: The application of innovative methods to diminish the amount of human creation called “waste” should be applied not only under commercial terms, but also under the humanitarian concept. Negative results of focusing only on the fastest relief of human suffer without attending the consequences of the flow of items left on the disaster zones, could bring in the medium term, critical environmental consequences, due to the creation of new waste. This research analyzes relevant approaches of the Humanitarian Relief of Aid under a Humanitarian Logistics point of view. It aims to find if those approaches have already a Reverse Logistic phase of the items provided by donors. The results demonstrate the absence of a Reverse Logistics Phase for items brought to disaster zones. Thus, some proposals were suggested for a new Reverse Logistic Phase in any humanitarian relief of aid. NGOs, donors participation, coordination among players on the scene, managing inventories, last mile distribution, performance measurement, relief of aid models,  and reverse logistics concepts applied to the humanitarian field would be only some of the themes revised on this research. These aim to enrich the readers’ knowledge on the topic as well as to provide an open panorama of the humanitarian actions employed in each Natural Disaster. The reader would acquire sufficient understanding to determine how feasible and reachable are the alternatives proposed by the authors. The relevance of this theme reveals a critical and not yet researched niche in Reverse Logistics under Humanitarian Logistics. It encourages more readers to research on it, explore and apply in future natural disasters. This research used a qualitative approach employing a semi-structured interview made to small and large humanitarian organizations.