A SYSTEMIC MODELING APPROACH TO REENGINEERING SAWMILLS - A SUPPLIERS PERSPECTIVE

Sawmill manufacturing systems are evolving to meet the needs of a chan ging business environment. One of the more significant changes is incr eased customer requirements for service, quality, and low prices. A sy stemic modelling approach is proposed as a tool to support business re engineering for sawmills to meet new business demands. A case study an alyzes the business relationship between a softwood producer and a lar ge homecenter chain to illustrate a recent trend in the lumber industr y that requires changes to the manufacturing system. The elements of t his modified relationship are the requirements to communicate through Electronic Data Interchange, to affix barcodes on every piece of lumbe r, and to maintain a self-replenishment stock of lumber in consignment at the reload site of the customer. In return, a long-term agreement is expected involving the delivery of large volumes of wood. First, th e systemic modelling approach provides an image of this modified relat ionship; then it assesses the impact of the relationship on the softwo od producer. Hence, several problems can be identified. Production coo rdination and control are particularly studied in their capacity to se rvice fully the homecenter chain. Finally, systemic models are present ed in the context of providing a framework to reengineer the process o f customer servicing. A scheme is proposed for the integration of seve ral functions of the Operating System in order to improve flexibility and responsiveness. The integration scheme also proposes to make use o f available Information Technology to bring together powerful planning , simulation, and optimization tools. Completely reengineered processe s are expected simultaneously to improve customer service and to signi ficantly improve profitability in sawmill manufacturing systems.