The logistics sector has been “whipsawed” during the COVID-19 pandemic. Labor shortages — at different times and in different geographic locations — have not only slowed the pace at which the overall speed of business moves, but in some cases, had an accordion-like effect of expanding and contracting the labor force and its productivity in different locations at the same time. This has drastically impacted our world’s commerce.
Fewer adults are available in the workforce due to childcare issues, and loyalty to one’s employer is being challenged daily as companies that need workers bid up the cost of those available workers. Sickness causes workers to be out in 10-day blocks, due to exposure to an all-too-common virus. Our productivity as humans both increases and shrinks as COVID-19 cuts swaths across geographic areas and continents.
This whipsaw effect has negatively impacted the ability to load and unload vessels at ports, as well as the availability of equipment like containers, chassis, and trucks where shippers needed them when they needed them. This, in turn, has crippled the ability to use existing infrastructure to help the wheels of commerce keep moving and get cargo to its ultimate destination.
These fits and starts and resulting expansions and contractions are also now starting to cause shortages of commodities — the plastic used in many products, rare metals used in technology like computer chips, and raw materials used to make energy, like the coal needed in China for the power necessary to support a large manufacturing sector. These shortages then geometrically expand, causing other issues.
Unfortunately, until more of the US and the world are vaccinated and the impact of the pandemic wanes, I believe 2022 will have more of the same type of issues. The US will achieve some sort of herd immunity, which will help lessen the issues, but domestic problems will be exacerbated by the impact of the pandemic on the rest of the world.
We in the US also need to deal with our labor issues; higher wages, childcare assistance, and leisure time will all come to the forefront in 2022. I believe that the fate of the supply chain as we know it rests in the hands of those that choose not to follow the science and get vaccinated, prolonging our delay to return to business as normal.