Logistics

PAMA - Pan-African Mobility Alliance

Foundation

Better training and working conditions in Africa through innovative logistics solutions

In order to strengthen Africa's economic development by building sustainable jobs in the areas of mobility for economic goods and people, the Pan-African Mobility Alliance (PAMA) was founded in Berlin by Federal Development Minister Dr Gerd Müller together with companies and TU Berlin. The Chair of Logistics at TU Berlin conducts research on novel logistics solutions and supply chains for the development of African countries together with African partners, supports local education and training and organises exchanges of students, doctoral candidates and professors.

The launch of PAMA took place during the G20 Summit - Compact with Africa in Berlin in November 2019. The twelve Compact countries include North African states such as Morocco and Egypt, West African countries such as Guinea and Burkina Faso, but also East African Rwanda and Ethiopia.

Through this targeted methodical cooperation between politics, business and science, new supply chains, innovative logistical solutions and mobility offers are to be developed and implemented more quickly in the African compact countries. The aim is to support the industrial value creation of manufacturers and suppliers in the automotive, transport technology, food and clothing industries in Africa. It also aims to strengthen the performance level of logistics and improve living, training and working conditions on the continent through logistics. PAMA is an open platform for universities, companies and associations in Germany and Africa.

The head of the Logistics Chair, Prof. Dr.-Ing. Frank Straube, and the research assistants Dr. Benjamin Nitsche and Julia Kleineidam have played a key role in shaping the concept and content of the foundation of the PAMA from the very beginning, together with the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (German Society for International Cooperation) and interested companies and associations. The Logistics Chair is already active in various training and research projects in Ethiopia.

Prof. Dr. Angela Ittel, Vice-President for Strategic Development, Young Academics and Teacher Training at TU Berlin, accompanies these activities as part of TU Berlin's internationalisation strategy.

 

Opening workshop

The Chair of Logistics at the TU Berlin, headed by Prof. Dr.-Ing. Frank Straube, is conducting a Pan-African Automotive Logistics Workshop together with the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) and the Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) with representatives of the German automotive manufacturing and supply industry as well as logistics service providers in order to analyse current obstacles and challenges as well as examples of successful logistics in African countries and to assess logistics potentials for increasing value-added activities on the African continent.

This new and targeted methodical cooperation between politics, business and science is intended to speed up the development and implementation of logistics solutions to support industrial value creation and new types of mobility services in emerging African countries in a "Logistics Action Plan for Africa", to strengthen the performance level of logistics in Africa and to improve living and working conditions in Africa through logistics. German and African companies will be sustainably supported in their development on the African continent through these activities and new types of scientific cooperation in the field of logistics will be developed in a targeted manner. The provision of knowledge for the development of good logistics in Africa as a navigation tool that can be used by all interested actors in the sense of an Open Living Lab should significantly improve the speed of innovation and cooperation in German-African logistics networks.

Results from extensive research by the Logistics Chair on the development of humanitarian logistics systems in Africa, headed by Prof. Dr.-Ing. Helmut Baumgarten, support this initiative.

On 5 and 6 June in Berlin, a first workshop on this topic took place with interested companies under the leadership of the TU Berlin. The focus is on the topic clusters of assembly supply, supplier parks, transport networks, mobility concepts for cities and the distribution of vehicles and spare parts. All relevant topic areas of logistics (e.g. infrastructure, education level, technologies, planning and control, networks, administrative boundary conditions, etc.) will be evaluated.

 

If you are an automotive manufacturer, supplier or transport service provider and are also interested in participating, please contact Prof. Dr.-Ing. Frank Straube (straube@logistik.tu-berlin.de) or Dr. Benjamin Nitsche (nitsche@logistik.tu-berlin.de) as soon as possible. The Global Supply Chain Network (BVL) supports this initiative.

Contact

Dr.

Benjamin Nitsche

Research Associate

nitsche@logistik.tu-berlin.de

+49 30 314-26007

Organization name Logistics
Office H 90
Building Hauptgebäude (H)
Room H 9174
Office hoursby appointment