The journey of food or medicine does not begin at the warehouse, nor does it end at the door of the store or hospital. For temperature-sensitive products, the hours a shipment spends in a port or parking lot, or the way it is loaded, may be enough to determine whether it reaches its destination and the value and quality it leaves the point of production.
In Saudi Arabia, this equation is gaining increasing importance with the expansion of local food production, the growth of the movement of fresh and frozen products, and the expansion of pharmaceutical and healthcare supply chains. With estimates that the cold chain logistics market in the Kingdom will reach about $2.26 billion in 2026, the need is expanding for a system capable of not only preserving temperatures, but also managing the entire journey more efficiently.
Here the challenge moves from the mere availability of refrigerated warehouses and equipped trucks, to the extent to which these assets are able to operate as a single system. From the port and yards, to transportation, warehousing and distribution, all the way to the final customer. Every delay or additional handling point may raise the risk of thermal drift and increase energy consumption and costs, while speed of recovery becomes a critical factor when supply disruptions occur.
The importance of cooling efficiency is not limited to the logistical aspect. At the global level, the lack of effective refrigeration is associated with the loss of about 526 million tons of food annually, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization; Which makes temperature control part of the food security equation and reducing waste, and not just a transportation and storage service. Temperature-sensitive pharmaceutical products also impose strict preservation and transportation requirements to ensure their quality is maintained.
Thus, the next challenge facing the Saudi market does not appear to be related only to adding new capacity, but rather to the efficiency of the network and its ability to absorb delays, high temperatures, and supply disruptions, and then restore the normal pace of operation with the least loss, time, and cost.
This need coincides with the expansion of the base of facilities that rely on temperature-controlled storage and transportation services. Last January, the Food and Drug Authority announced that the total number of its licensed factories and warehouses would rise to 9,155 facilities during 2025, an increase of 18 percent over the previous year, including 5,344 food warehouses and 568 pharmaceutical warehouses. This number includes the various activities subject to the Authority’s jurisdiction, but it reflects the breadth of operations that require specialized solutions to preserve time- and temperature-sensitive products across the supply stages.
In this context, the efficiency of the cold chain is not measured by the availability of infrastructure or compliance with regulatory requirements alone, but rather by the ability of its various components to work interconnectedly and respond quickly when any disruption or delay occurs.
Logistics expert Engineer Hassan Al Hilal told Asharq Al-Awsat that the readiness of the cold chain in the Kingdom is “good in terms of infrastructure,” with the importance of continuing to enhance integration and operational flexibility between its various links.
Al Hilal explained that the Kingdom has witnessed, in recent years, a clear expansion in refrigerated and frozen warehouses, specialized transportation, and distribution centers, in addition to the development of regulatory and supervisory systems and digital transformation. He explained that the maturity of the cold chain cannot be measured by the number of warehouses or trucks only, but rather by its ability to maintain the temperature and quality of the product, and its arrival time from the point of origin to the point of use without interruption.
Integration determines the efficiency of the cold chain
The logistics expert identified the most prominent points of challenge at the links between the port and the yards, transportation, warehouses and distribution centres, explaining that the prolonged stay of refrigerated containers in the yards, or delayed handling and loading may increase operational risks, energy consumption and the possibility of thermal deviation.
The challenge, according to Al Hilal, is to manage the cold chain as an integrated system that begins with the supplier and ends with the customer, so that its efficiency is measured by its ability to maintain the required temperature and reduce waiting time and thermal deviations, even in conditions of operational and climate pressure and crises.
At the market level, Al Hilal estimated the volume of cold chain services in Saudi Arabia at about $2.17 billion in 2025, and about $2.26 billion in 2026, expecting it to rise to $2.76 billion in 2031, with a compound annual growth rate of 4.12 percent between 2026 and 2031. These estimates are consistent with the latest “Murder Intelligence” data.
According to Al Hilal, the growth in demand is due to factors that include food security, the expansion of local food production and processing, the increase in consumption of fresh and frozen products, in addition to the growth of the pharmaceutical, healthcare and e-commerce sectors and the development of modern distribution channels.
With the expansion of uses, the next challenge is not only related to increasing storage capacity, but also to providing refrigerated capacities in appropriate locations and with the required specifications. The market is gradually moving towards more integrated networks linking warehousing, transportation and distribution, with the location of capacity, the speed of product movement between loops, and the network's ability to respond to disruptions becoming increasingly important.
Climate increases the cost of cooling
According to Al Hilal, the Saudi climate represents a direct operational and economic factor in the cold chain, as high summer temperatures in several regions impose additional requirements on cooling, insulation, and energy systems, at a time when food and pharmaceutical products need specific temperature ranges according to their nature.
He explained that the widening difference between the external temperature and the required preservation degrees increases the loads on the cooling systems, and is reflected in the consumption of electricity in warehouses and the energy needed to operate the refrigeration units of trucks and containers, in addition to increasing the operating hours of compressors, maintenance needs, and the possibility of malfunctions.
The effect of heat is not limited to transportation, but extends to loading, unloading, and waiting in ports, yards, and distribution centers, as opening doors for long periods leads to hot air entering and raising the thermal load on cooling equipment.
In this context, Al Hilal stresses the importance of pre-cooling products before loading them, explaining that the refrigeration units in containers and trucks are primarily designed to maintain the temperature of the load, and not to reduce the temperature of products that were loaded higher than the required level, which may increase the risk of thermal deviation even if the unit is operating normally.
Al Hilal does not see the possibility of determining a fixed rate for the increase in the cost of the cold chain in Saudi Arabia compared to moderate markets, because it varies according to the type of product, the required temperature, the efficiency of the equipment and insulation, the length of the transportation path, energy prices, and the method of operation. But he stresses that the Saudi climate imposes higher demands on energy, equipment, maintenance and insulation compared to many temperate markets.
Loss begins before damage
Regarding the loss file, Al Hilal sees the difficulty of determining an accurate national percentage of food or pharmaceutical products that are lost due to a defect in the cold chain, because the available data on loss and waste includes multiple stages, from production, packaging, storage, transportation, and distribution until consumption, and does not detail the losses resulting from thermal deviations.
The latest results of the national measurement of food loss and waste in Saudi Arabia showed a decrease in the total percentage to 27.9 percent, compared to 33.1 percent in the 2019 baseline, but this indicator does not specifically measure losses associated with the cold chain.
Al Hilal explained that the risks are concentrated in products that are temperature-sensitive and have a short shelf life, such as meat, poultry, fish, dairy products, fresh fruits and vegetables, in addition to medicines and vital products. The loss may begin as soon as the charge experiences thermal deflection, even if it later returns to the required temperature.
Ports and yards, loading and unloading operations, lack of pre-cooling, long transportation paths, and multiple delivery points during the final stage of distribution stand out as among the most prominent points of risk. In the pharmaceutical sector, the issue becomes more sensitive, as thermal deviation may affect the properties of the product without this necessarily appearing on its external appearance, depending on the nature of the product and the manufacturer’s instructions.
Resilience emerges in times of crisis
Al Hilal believes that the Kingdom has become more capable of dealing with supply chain disruptions compared to previous years, distinguishing between absorbing a short-term disruption and dealing with a long crisis. He explained that the continuity of food and medicine does not depend on the cold chain alone, but rather on a system that includes inventory, diversity of sources of supply, ports, transportation, storage, local production, distribution, and speed of decision-making.
As for refrigerated and frozen products, he said that diverting the shipment to a port or alternative route requires the availability of refrigerated storage capacity, trucks, handling equipment, electrical power, and clearance capacity, while maintaining the product temperature throughout the rerouting process. Time becomes a critical factor, as every additional hour in port, yard, or during transfer raises the risks and costs.
Al Hilal places “recovery time” among the most important indicators of cold chain flexibility, along with the level of inventory, days of coverage, spare capacity, the percentage of shipments subject to real-time monitoring, the thermal deviation rate, the length of time refrigerated containers remain in ports and yards, and the system’s ability to redirect shipments.
It is proposed to test this flexibility by simulating operational crises, such as the closure of a major port for 72 hours or a delay in imports for a week, and measuring the speed of activation of alternatives, cases of thermal anomalies, and the time required for the system to return to normal operation.
Technology is moving into forecasting
On the technical side, Al Hilal said that the use of shipment tracking and temperature monitoring technologies has become more widespread in the transportation and refrigerated storage sector in the Kingdom, especially in food, medicines and temperature-sensitive products, with the level of application varying between companies and products.
He explained that the most important development is the move from simply tracking the location of the vehicle or container to monitoring the location of the shipment, its temperature, the condition of the refrigeration unit, and operational conditions at the same time. He pointed out the difference between temperature recording and real-time monitoring, as the latter allows detecting a defect during the flight and intervening before it turns into a loss.
This aspect is applied supervisory in the Kingdom. In November 2020, the Food and Drug Authority, in cooperation with the Public Transport Authority, launched a service to track and measure temperatures and humidity for food and drug vehicles and warehouses via the “wasl” platform. The authority also continues to publish a list of facilities qualified to manage and track temperature and humidity, and its last visible update was in July 2026.
In the pharmaceutical sector, the Authority announced in April 2026, in cooperation with “Saudi Cargo”, an initiative to provide facilities for air freight services in support of the supply chains of medicines and medical supplies.
Al Hilal stressed that technology does not reduce damage alone, unless linked to rapid operational procedures, calling for moving from monitoring to predicting risks by analyzing real-time and historical data to detect indicators of malfunctions, delays, or high temperatures before they worsen.
Al Hilal summarizes the flexibility of the cold chain in three interconnected elements: continuity of supply, maintaining product quality, and speed of recovery from disturbances, pointing out that the strength of the infrastructure is not enough unless the components of the system work in an interconnected manner and are able to redirect operations and recover with the least possible time, cost, and loss.
