Identificación de alternativas para la reducción de costos en el proceso de transporte de caña manual en un ingenio del Valle del Cauca

Abstract

"IDENTIFICATION OF ALTERNATIVES FOR COST REDUCTION IN THE MANUAL CANE TRANSPORTATION PROCESS AT A SUGAR MILL IN VALLE DEL CAUCA” is a project that arises from the need of a sugar mill to reduce its operating costs and ultimately achieve higher profits. This is part of a range of projects defined by the company's management in conjunction with the management area (improvement area) and with the help of the owners of the different processes. In the transportation process for the manual cane harvest at the sugar mill, it was aimed to apply tools from the DMAIC methodology, defining its objectives according to each stage to ultimately achieve the savings. Firstly, the goal of average weight per wagon was sought to be defined. The options proposed by the methodology were reviewed with the support of management to set an achievable but challenging goal. Secondly, the behavior of the cost indicator for manual transportation was measured based on what was executed in 2023 and historical data from 2022. In this phase, transportation costs were mapped in a tree diagram to identify the items that directly affect and thus achieve a detailed understanding of the behavior and identify the focus that could help achieve the defined goal. The first indication to work on the costs of using tractor trailers per ton of cane transported primarily came from this measurement. Thirdly, after having a cost analysis in the previous step, a more descriptive statistical analysis of the impacting indicators was carried out through Pareto diagrams, cause analysis, until reaching the details of deeper analyses such as variation and statistical capacity of the indicator with the greatest impact on the cost of manual transportation (Ton/Wagon). At this point, the process's ability to meet the objectives proposed by the company in terms of indicator control was demonstrated.