Sustainability in Logistics: Balancing Climate Ambition with Commercial Survival
I was invited to contribute an article to FIATA's (the International Federation of Freight Forwarders Associations) Review Magazine as part of the FIATA Congress in Milan to celebrate its 100th anniversary.
Sustainability lower on the corporate agenda
Today, freight forwarders face three main climate-related demands. Customers increasingly expect low-emission transport options and credible emissions information to help meet their own climate targets. Regulations, reporting requirements and investor scrutiny are affecting operators, subcontractors, modal choices and supply chains. Companies are also facing heat, flooding, storms and drought, which can cause infrastructure failure, energy disruption and other threats to continuity. Climate action must therefore expand to include adaptation to physical climate risks.
Yet these demands compete for attention with other urgent priorities. Boardroom attention has shifted to geopolitical and societal risks, the race to adopt Artificial Intelligence (AI), and the continued need to protect margins, service quality and competitiveness.
As a result, some companies have pushed sustainability and climate action down the agenda. Others are trying to balance climate ambition with commercial survival by meeting minimum customer and regulatory requirements, gradually integrating sustainability into business operations, and implementing decarbonisation measures where these make commercial sense. That may seem pragmatic, but in reality it is a siloed approach: decarbonisation sits with sustainability, geopolitical and operational risks are handled by risk departments, and AI is pursued through separate digital or business initiatives. Adaptation often falls through the cracks.
Sustainability as innovation driver
Commercial survival requires one integrated approach. Companies need to look at these developments together and use sustainability and AI as innovation drivers that reinforce each other, grounded in the commercial reality in which the business operates.
First, companies need to shift from focusing on decarbonisation alone to building resilience. This means reducing emissions while also addressing physical climate risks and other disruption risks across logistics networks and customer supply chains. The aim is not only to decarbonise individual activities, but to strengthen the infrastructure, operations and workforce on which the wider system depends.
Second, better data, digital tools, climate modelling and AI can improve visibility, identify vulnerabilities and support planning and coordination. Sustainability helps define what this integrated approach should achieve, including lower emissions, greater climate resilience, reliable energy and continued access to the goods and services on which businesses and communities depend.
Third, these capabilities can become a clear customer value proposition. The lasting advantage is greater reliability, stronger resilience and lower emissions. Freight forwarders that can demonstrate these outcomes will be better placed to thrive as climate, geopolitical and other risks increasingly interact.
Collaboration gets you further
Collaboration creates the opportunity to do this at scale. Freight forwarders, customers, governments, financiers and other actors all influence how logistics systems operate, where emissions arise and how vulnerable the system is to disruption. By sharing data, aligning priorities and investing together, they can reduce emissions and strengthen resilience in ways no single actor could achieve alone.
As FIATA enters its next 100 years, it can help bring these actors together and make this collaborative approach a source of innovation and commercial strength across the industry.