Since day one, the spread of a novel COVID-19 virus has become a learning edge for humanity that was caught by the throat.聽
Not only wasn鈥檛 pandemic something new to humanity, but soon the arrival of a killer virus has actually been anticipated by many scientists and global leaders for a while. Nevertheless, most of these messages remained without attention until this spring when it already was too late to prepare, and just the time to react.聽
Now we all are looking forward to the day when we can get back to normal. But when it鈥檚 over, the world and each country will have a lot to take home for correction work. And the one system that definitely will need to be reconsidered in the aftermath of the pandemic is our supply chain.聽
Despite the many forecasts of a global pandemic, since the SARS outbreak in 2003, the world became much more dependent on China-manufactured goods. The current crisis made this dependency undeniably obvious and demonstrated its weakness.聽
Supply chains have been shaking and shivering since the announcement of the pandemic (and I鈥檓 afraid we are not done yet). I feel that in the current situation only the time will show if they will make it through the pandemic or will collapse, leading to global starvation that I see being mentioned more and more in global COVID-19 related discourse. Even a minor failure may lead to a rise in death tolls due to a lack of medication. We may see the return of diseases that we鈥檝e overcome in the past with the help of vaccination and who knows what else.聽
Most of the vital items we are using (and almost all non-essential ones as well) are manufactured in China and India. Since the early 2000s, China outcompeted the world in manufacturing active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) from the financial standpoint, thus pretty much quietly taking control over the pharmaceutical market. Only 10 per cent of generic drugs used in the States is produced within the country, and it seems that the situation in Canada is no better. So if anything disrupts the manufacturing process, the West is left with no real means to affect it and no alternative.聽
A huge percentage of the essential medical supplies used by the world is accounted for by the two giants as well. And they can be nationalized in case of emergency. Besides, even in case of emergency, the governments can only exert influence over the production within the country, not over the production offshored by local companies or contracts signed with foreign make.
The current pandemic has demonstrated that the entire seemingly reliable supply chain may fail in the face of a deathly virus. And not that it was completely unexpected. The scientists were calling for it for a while, but nothing changed then and now we know how vulnerable we actually are.
This means that the manufacturing, food production and trade might and should be reorganized when we come out of it. And that may open some long-searched for doors for stagnating or transitioning communities like Estevan.聽
Dr. Michael T. Osterholm of the University of Minnesota, who is a Regents professor, holds an endowed chair, founded the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy, has been cautious about the dependency of the global market on China and India long before the 2019-20 outbreak. Watching the situation now he believes that the critical changes are to happen in the supply chain: 鈥淚 think that you're going to see a lot of the private sector taking a step back after this pandemic has run its course and asking ourselves, 'Do we want to be vulnerable to these very isolated location supply chain issues?' And what does redundancy mean? Are they cautious? But it may be a wise investment in the future ... The economic cost of this pandemic to the world is almost immeasurable. And now people have to understand what do we do.鈥�
Hopefully, when we are through this (which is probably still a long ways away), the industrialized west may reconsider its politics and direct its efforts towards the support of local manufacturing. And this is what not only Estevan, but Western Canada needs moving forward.聽聽
Be it APIs or parts, clothes or medical equipment, throughout its history Estevan has been a reliable resource and energy supplier for many, many decades. The infrastructure is here, the workforce is here, the training capacities are set and people are eager to keep their hometown going. So if there is a demand for local production in after-COVID times, we definitely have the means to supply it. 聽
