Material Requirements Planning $($MRP$)$ is all about planning ahead so that everything is in place to produce the final product on time. It is primarily a planning tool, as opposed to an inventory or short$-$term dispatching technique. A great way to understand this concept better is to think about planning "backwards in time." A task that you have coming up is making cocolate chip cookies. Identify the tasks, plan out a schedule, and determine how long each task will take. Use the concepts covered in chapter $13$ to help with this discussion.