Freight Management and Performance of Food and Beverage Manufacturing Firms in Kenya

Abstract

: In the current 21 st century, there has been an increase in changes in the business environment that have forced large-scale enterprises to realign their global strategies and manufacturing activities, and flatten their hierarchies in order to speed up information flows. Food and beverage manufacturing companies in Kenya have been experiencing problems in the performance of their production and operations management. In view of the foregoing, it is relevant to investigate how Kenyan organizations could outsource their logistics requirements through freight management in the most efficient manner with regard to customer service and cost. This study therefore, sought to assess the influence of freight management on the performance of food and beverage manufacturing firms in Kenya. Based on the role played by policies and governance in the supply chain processes, this study also sought to assess the moderating effect of internal policy framework. The study was informed by the logistics theory. A descriptive research design was adopted. Food and beverage manufacturing companies were sampled and the data was collected using self-administered questionnaires and analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics. The findings revealed that freight management had a significant influence on the performance of food and beverage processing firms. Internal policy framework was also found to insignificantly moderate the relationship between freight management and performance of food and beverage processing firms. The study concluded that freight management was critical in enhancing the performance of food and beverage processing firms in Kenya. The study recommends that the management of food and beverage processing firms ought to embrace a freight management framework in order to gain performance.