Impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the international supply chain of swedish firms and measures to reduce vulnerability : a survey in collaboration with the confederation of Swedish enterprise

Abstract

During the first stage of the coronavirus pandemic in 2020, many companies faced disruptions in their international supply chains. This paper is based on a survey of 3441 Swedish companies. The findings reveal that 69.5% of the companies that use foreign suppliers experienced supply disruptions during the pandemic; in more than two-thirds of these cases problems persisted as of the time of the survey (November 2020). Planned measures to reduce vulnerability to future disruptions include increased inventories, spreading purchases over more suppliers and countries, and increasing domestic or regional sourcing. Only a small share of firms planned to re-shore production. Companies have heterogeneous views on desired state action to reduce vulnerability to future trade disruptions, ranging from calls to keep markets open, to doing more at EU level to coordinate on crisis measures, strengthening crisis preparedness to support for domestic producers through procurement and finance.