It is starting to happen again. Do you remember how “panic buying” caused a massive shortage of toilet paper and other basic essentials during the early days of the COVID pandemic last year? Well, shortages are back, but this time around different factors are at play. We are being told that the shortages should just be temporary, and that is good news. But this is yet another example that shows how exceedingly vulnerable global supply chains have become in this day and age. If another major global crisis were to suddenly strike, we could quickly be facing long-term shortages of certain items that would be quite severe. So hopefully this short-term toilet paper shortage will be a wake up call for all of us.
The following comes from Yahoo News…
Who can forget last year’s empty store shelves and pandemic panic shopping, right? Cleaning products, hand sanitizer and toilet paper were all but impossible to find, and only recently have name-brand disinfectant wipes and sprays begun showing up in stores again,
Well, brace yourself, because another product shortage is looming — and yes, it may very well become tough to find toilet paper again.
This new toilet paper shortage is not being caused by “panic buying”. Instead, two factors have combined to create serious delays in getting products from overseas…
For six days, Egypt’s Suez Canal was blocked by a giant cargo vessel that got stuck and held up hundreds of other ships on a route that handles about 12% of world trade. The Ever Given — about as long as the Empire State Building is tall — was finally freed Monday, but analysts say it could take more than a week to clear the backup.
Meanwhile, a shortage of shipping containers also is causing problems in the cargo transport industry. Many of the factories that build the giant metal boxes are in China — and a number of them shut down in the early days of the COVID crisis, cutting supplies short.
Needless to say, it won’t just be toilet paper that is affected. – READ MORE
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