Hi! I want to talk about a recent and popular topic, the Coronavirus and how this had affected the logistics and supply chain of many enterprises around the world, not only China. Wuhan is the capital of Hubei province, it was considered the political, economic, financial and commercial center of Central China, and was a major transportation hub that connected with other major cities. Wuhan is the most populous city in Central China, with a population of 9.8 million, has more than 6000 enterprises from over 80 countries, major industries include optical-electronics, automobile, iron, and steel manufacturing.
How coronavirus has affected logistics? On one hand, due to the coronavirus outbreak, the city has stopped its operations, most of the companies have shut down like PepsiCo, Siemens, Renault, Honda, and Peugeot Citroen, etc. The closure of the companies has affected national and international suppliers, transportation companies, employees, that have stopped operations due to orders cancellations.
On the other hand, there has been a shortage of products like food and masks. Masks and alcohol have increased the demand exponentially, national and international companies had at least double the production, are working 3 shifts a day, 7 days a week to increase the supply of these products in China, Japan, and countries that have coronavirus cases. How are been delivered? Logistics and transportation never stop, in Wuhan, these people are still working. In the case of food, there has been an increase in online orders, so people can receive their groceries at home and don´t have to get out of their homes. In the case of masks, alcohol, and medicine, the routes of transportation have increased, by truck, automobile, bicycle, and by foot.
Although a lot of sectors are not working, transportation cannot stop, is a vital element in order to support society with medicines and food. There are a lot of things related to logistics that we can talk about, this is just a small summary of enormous impact of a SRAS in society.
References
https://www.businessinsider.com/alibaba-group-fights-coronavirus-new-platform-2020-2?IR=T
The blog of Logistics at MGEPS at UPV 