Supply chains across industries are going through an unprecedented global disruption in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic which has shuttered airports, seaports and hampered the movement of goods and people around the world.
A lot of the early focus on supply chain disruption was on China as the world’s manufacturing center and the first venue of the Covid-19 breakout. That concern quickly shifted from day-to-day widgets to worries about the global pharmaceutical supply chain, China and India alone supply 90% of the finished product or raw material of many small molecule drugs to the United States, Europe and Africa.
With Africa much of the focus is on supply chains around health and agriculture including food security—30% to 50% of the food produced in Sub Saharan Africa is estimated to be lost along the supply chain. The issue might be less about major disruption on continent but more about the over-reliance on underdeveloped supply chains which struggle in the wake of the global crisis.
