ABSTRACT
The transportation problem is a special type of linear programming problem. The definition of basic feasible solution of the transportation problem is the same as the definition of the linear programming problem. An unbalanced transportation problem can be made a balanced transportation problem. W. R. Vogel's Approximation Method preferred over the other two methods discussed above because it produces best possible minimizes cost and close to an optimal solution. Therefore, if one use the starting basic feasible solution obtained by Vogel's approximation method and proceeds to solve for the optimum solution, then the time required to arrive at the optimum solution is greatly reduced. Least cost method usually provides a better starting basic feasible solution than the northwest corner method since it takes into account the cost variables in the problem. The chapter presents a computational procedure to find an optimal solution from the starting basic feasible solution (BFS).
