Applications of Lean Manufacturing to Reduce Waste in the Crumb Rubber Industry

Abstract

This study focused on reducing waste in rubber powder production using Lean Manufacturing tools and improving process cycle efficiency. A quantitative case study was conducted at PT Perkebunan Nusantara IV Region 1, Gunung Para Plantation, North Sumatra, Indonesia. Waste was identified using the types-of-waste framework and ranked according to its impact on the production process. The selection of appropriate Lean tools was guided by Value Stream Mapping (VSM). The process was analyzed using Current Value Stream Mapping (CVSM), fishbone diagrams, and Future Value Stream Mapping (FVSM). The primary objective was to identify and reduce waste in the crumb rubber production process. The major types of waste identified were waiting time, excess inventory, product defects, and overprocessing. Based on the value stream analysis, several improvement strategies were proposed. The initial process cycle efficiency was 96.26%. After the proposed improvements were applied, particularly those aimed at reducing non-value-added time in the future value stream, process cycle efficiency increased by 1.82 percentage points to 98.08%. In addition, the production lead time decreased from 16,779.32 minutes to 16,467.93 minutes, representing a reduction of 311.39 minutes. The application of Lean Manufacturing and Value Stream Mapping effectively reduced production waste and improved the overall efficiency of the crumb rubber production process.