The logistic and supply chain is describing the managing of planning, implementing and controlling the process of the shipment of goods. The best storage method during shipment must also be considered during this process in order to arrive safely to the supermarkets in order to meet the consumers’ requirements.

Food miles can also emphasise a way that mathematics is used in everyday life. These miles describe how many miles your food has travelled before arriving on your plate. This includes the distance from the producer to the supermarket and finally to the consumer. Food miles are a good example of mathematics. These miles can be broken down into kilometres, meters, centimetres and eventually millimetres. This can be broken down further by the description of number recognition and sequences. This emphasises the fundamental principles of mathematics as it can be broken down in to the most basic concept.  Food miles are important in everyday life and are used to encourage people to buy locally as the miles are often calculated through the pollution that was caused during the journey.

During the journey, a variety of other mathematical factors must be considered. When shipping the products, the correct method of packaging must be considered in order to carry the biggest amount of goods possible at once. This includes thinking about the weight, size and temperature requirements for each of the individual products. The shelf life must also be calculated through how long it took the food to travel to the supermarket and how long left it has left on it’s sell by date. All of these factors are influenced by mathematics whether it be amounts in a variety of forms or simple calculations.

Before any of the products even make their journey to the supermarkets, the businesses must demand plan. This is when the supermarket plans exactly what products they want and how much of each. This can be done by looking at the previous years data that was collected in order to judge whether they need more or less and what to get at certain times of the year. A good example of this is pumpkins. This is because buyers are usually only interested in them around the time of Halloween. During a clip from BBC1’s Supermarket Secrets (‘Autumns Supermarket Secrets’, 2015) it’s stated that “no one wants a pumpkin a day after Halloween. And the stores can’t run out too early.” This is a great example why supermarkets must look back at the data they collected on how much pumpkins were sold previously and on which particular dates as they don’t want to buy too many or too little.

In the future, this will help me develop my own health and well-being lesson on these areas. I believe it is important for children to understand how their food was produced and how far it’s travelled before they were able to buy it from the supermarket. Using food I bring into class, I will have the children calculate the food miles of each product through using the ‘Food Miles Calculator’ – accessible from https://www.foodmiles.com/. Although this information has gave me lesson ideas for when I’m teaching, I have learned how mathematics is needed throughout the logistic and supply chain which will be useful for me when ordering a number of resources for my classroom.

‘Autumn’s Supermarket Secrets’ (2015) Supermarket Secrets, BBC 1 London, 25 October. Available at: https://learningonscreen.ac.uk/ondemand/index.php/clip/27113 (Accessed: 20 November 2016)