Modelling and optimizing port logistic services

Today?s conditions necessitate firms to control products? prices continuously, which accordingly provides control over their costs, and productivity better than before. These can not only be realized with the improvements on firms? internal processes but also the collaboration power between the parts of the supply chain such as supplier, customer, distributor and transporter will affect the success. The success of the chain depends on the factors such as communication of each and every part of the supply chain with one another, the determination of operational standards and realization of these standards, as well as accurate information flow. As each success and failure of the part on the supply chain would affect the eventual result, the management of the supply chain is a critical issue. Logistics consuming power determines firms? competition power at international market and this is why the importance of logistics management becomes fundamental. At this study, part of the supply chain ? port logistics was analyzed in detail. Especially general cargo type export products loading process is in the scope of this project. Firstly present baseline vessel loading rate is measured. Then the factors that effect the baseline loading performance is determined with hypothesis testing. The aim of this study is to display the methodology for increasing the loading rate of the vessel. While revealing the necessities, mathematical models, such as fuzzy minimal spanning tree, fuzzy shortest path, fuzzy dynamic programming, simulation and statistical methods are utilized. The problem is solved with three different fuzzy mathematical models. The results of each model are compared. Also for each mathematical model duality analysis is applied. It is aimed to determine the opportunity income that can be gained as a result of increased loading rates, optimum vessel rental agreements, and how to obtain decreased frieght prices and effective source usage for production firms. Key words: port logistics, general cargo, fuzzy minimal spanning tree, fuzzy shortest path, fuzzy dynamic programming, simulation.