Case Article—Optimal Movement Plan of Rice in the State of Andhra Pradesh

The case discusses an optimal movement plan for food grains (rice) by a state sponsored agency, the Food Corporation of India (FCI) in the State of Andhra Pradesh in India. There are five resource locations and eleven demand locations in this distribution network. Resource capacity and demand requirement for the three product (rice) variants at each location are known. There is no storage capacity restriction either in the demand or source location. Information related to rail network, its connectivity, distance in kilometers between origin-destination pairs, cost of transportation per tonne of food grain by rail or road are known. The primary issue is to develop a monthly movement plan to minimize the overall transportation costs subject to meeting the demand-supply restrictions. The total supply available for distribution and the total requirement at various locations are both equal at the product variant and aggregate level. The secondary issue is to develop an alternative movement plan to fulfil the demand requirements at a location, Karimnagar, which does not have a direct rail connection. Few plans are proposed to resolve the issues; the case encourages analysis of the problem situation and evaluation of the alternate resolution plans.

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