Lean – conscious
Power outages in China, chaos at gas stations in Britain, idle factories, fuel shortages and disruptions to logistics chains in many countries are threatening to hamper the recovery of the global economy after the recession caused by the “Covid-19” crisis. ”, according to Agence. France-Presse.
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Last week saw new examples of difficulties that are blocking supplies around the world. China is suffering from a severe shortage of coal to power its power stations, the UK does not have enough drivers to drive trucks to deliver fuel, food and other goods, and across Europe, gas prices are rising to large because the supply is insufficient to fulfill. demand.
Niklas Poitier, a researcher at the Bruegel Institute in Brussels, says, “The risk is that growth will slow down despite reopening the economies, because we will not be able to produce what people demand.”
Statistics show the current economic difficulties.
In France and the Chicago area, industrial activity last month recorded the lowest level since the beginning of 2021 (January and February), while industrial production in Japan fell in August for the second month in a row, and there were difficulties in with the supply of raw materials A impact on the production capacity of companies.
The shortage of some chips has particularly affected the automotive industry. Toyota lowered its production expectations last month, and the Stellantis group (Peugeot and Fiat) will close its factory in Germany to manufacture Opel cars in early 2022, citing an “exceptional” situation.
The sector could lose a turnover of $210 billion this year, almost double expectations at the beginning of the year, according to recent forecasts by Alixpartners.
The alarm is also ringing in the clothing sector, as Swedish ready-to-wear giant H&M spoke on Thursday, presenting its results, about “disruptions and delays in the delivery of materials” in September.
For its part, the giant Swedish group Ikea is struggling due to a shortage in the number of employees in the transport sector and the prices of raw materials.
Among the strong pressures of the post-Covid economic recovery is a five-fold increase in the cost of shipping in a year for travel from China to the West Coast of the United States, according to the Fritos index on the Baltic Stock Exchange.
The researcher Jacob Kirkegaard at the Peterson Institute in Washington explains that it is difficult for the container sector to adapt quickly to sockets, because there is also a serious shortage of container carriers, but he believes that this situation should be analyzed “as a risk of delay put on the story. I don’t think the shock will be strong.”
Niclas Poitier claims that “most of these problems must be solved in the medium term,” speaking about the possibility that we will see solutions after several chapters of turmoil.
Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell believes that these difficulties may be “larger and longer than expected.”
Until then, congestion can be eased in some ports such as the Port of Los Angeles. The situation may also improve in important production centers such as those in Vietnam, which have just emerged from a three-month closure in Ho Chi Minh City, the economic lung of the country, but for now, the epidemic is still in control.
“In the United Kingdom or in Europe, they are acting as if the epidemic is over,” says Frances Coppola, writer of the financial blog “Coppola Comment.”
She said, “International trade cannot return to normal as long as people are still dying from (Covid) in some countries.”
2024-10-01 22:55:32