Food, Energy and Water (FEW) supply chains are supported by infrastructure. FEW commodities tend to be massive and voluminous, and therefore require substantial infrastructure. Inflow/Outflow or Import/Export are implied in every step of the supply chain. At each step in the supply chain there is a point of origin of the flow, a point of destination for the flow, a route traveled by the flow, and a mode of transportation for the commodity flow. The FEWSION team has developed a standard supply chain and infrastructure model to help us communicate about supply chains, explained and diagrammed below.
Seven FEWSION Supply Chain Model Steps:
- Extraction (from the environment, at the source, primary industry only): E
- Production (manufacturing, processing, value-add, business to business): P
- Storage (mass stockpiling, hubs, reserves): S
- Distribution (transportation, warehousing, last mile distribution): D
- Retail (last mile delivery): R
- Consumption (by human end users, not companies or producers): C
- Waste (from all sources, both producers and consumers, including recycling and reuse): W
FEWSION Supply Chain Model Diagrams
What follows is a graphical summary of commodities, supply chains, and infrastructures for each of the major components of the FEW infrastructure and supply chain.