Russia’s invasion of Ukraine means the food inflation that’s been plaguing global consumers is now tipping into a full-blown crisis, potentially outstripping even the pandemic’s blow and pushing millions more into hunger.
Putin’s assault on Ukraine, and retaliatory steps designed to paralyze the Russian economy, are heaping new disruptions on supply chains that never recovered from unprecedented shocks caused by the pandemic.
After years of growing increasingly reliant on cheap and abundant wheat supplies from Russia and Ukraine, the world’s grains buyers are being forced to hunt elsewhere as flows from both countries dry up.
The supply squeeze on the U.S. economy tightened further in February, indicating no relief for domestic producers and pointing to persistent inflationary pressures.
Ben Ruddell, director and professor in the School of Informatics, Computing and Cyber Systems at Northern Arizona University, offers a perspective on whether we can expect another wave of shortages of essential products on store shelves this year.
Omicron is ripping through cargo ships, raising concerns that a surge in cases, coupled with China’s tightened quarantine requirements for vessels, could delay supply chain stabilization for the shipping industry.
The bottlenecked ports in Los Angeles face a narrow window between now and midyear to clear container backlogs before another import surge and union-contract talks threaten to stall progress moving record volumes of cargo through the busiest U.S. gateway for trade.
The U.S. Transportation Department is awarding some $450 million in grants for port-related projects to bolster capacity and improve the movement of goods, senior Biden administration officials say.
Juan Cazorla, head of the Transportation and Logistics Specialized Industry Group of Regions Bank, offers both a short-term and long-term outlook for the transportation and logistics industry.