General outsourcing perspective in Turkish firms
In a majority (47 percent) of the respondent firms, purchasing, supply, inventory
management, order fulfilling, customer services, production scheduling and
negotiations with salespersons are accepted as in-house logistics activities. In a
three-year time period, these firms do not consider outsourcing the logistics activities
mentioned above. Similarly, warehousing activities are held by the firm itself in 76
percent of the firms. Only 24 percent outsource warehousing to other logistics firms
and 23.5 percent of the respondents intend to outsource their logistics activities within
a three-year time period. Nearly 93.5 percent of the respondents outsource their
transportation activities. It can be seen that Turkish firms in particular outsource
transportation activities and the direct participation of manufacturer firms in
transportation is expected to decrease visibly within a three-year time period.
Therefore the current 3PLs, in fact, play the role of freight transporters.