4.4 • 796 Ratings
🗓️ 16 December 2025
⏱️ 18 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
It’s transforming the world of road haulage, but has the recent ‘Uberisation’ been good news for truckers?
From Nanjing to Nairobi, we discover how digital freight matching platforms are changing the way drivers access work, plan routes and the impact it’s having on the climate. But with driverless trucks on the horizon, what does the future hold for truckers and trucking firms?
If you'd like to get in touch with the programme, our email address is [email protected]
Presenter: Sam Gruet Producer: Megan Lawton
(Picture: A white 18 wheeler truck on the road. Credit: Getty Images)
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, Music, radio, podcasts. |
| 0:05.5 | Hello and welcome to Business Daily with me Sam Gruet. |
| 0:10.0 | Today, we're talking about a global trillion-dollar industry that's the backbone of economies around the world. |
| 0:17.5 | Trucking. |
| 0:18.1 | Across Africa, employees, I'd say 7 to 10 million people. And asking whether technology |
| 0:23.2 | can overcome some of the issues facing the industry. From a global worker shortage, |
| 0:28.7 | the work is tough. Margin can be low. Younger generation don't want the job. To CO2 emissions. |
| 0:35.5 | Asthma is heavily associated with that airframe freight, ozone generation particulates. |
| 0:40.3 | And how artificial intelligence could impact it all. |
| 0:43.8 | It's not going to end with people worrying about self-driving trucks. |
| 0:48.2 | That's going to take a while. |
| 0:49.6 | It's technology good news for truckers. |
| 0:52.2 | That's coming up on Business Daily. |
| 0:56.1 | It's a rainy day here in Vancouver as a shelter underneath the awnings of a truck stop |
| 1:02.3 | surrounded as you can probably hear by the grumbling of several large lorries, each of them coming |
| 1:08.4 | here to fuel up before making their way onwards across Canada and North America. |
| 1:14.3 | Some of the lorries here have got massive trailers behind them. Many of the people here will work |
| 1:21.4 | for larger companies, but some and a good proportion of those will be owner operated, i.e. driving their own trucks, owning their own business. |
| 1:30.5 | Something that's enabling that to happen is technology, |
| 1:33.8 | which has given drivers greater access to freight loads |
| 1:37.2 | and to companies looking to have stuff moved across the country. |
| 1:42.0 | There were more than 324,000 truckers on Canada's roads in 2021, |
... |
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