Chinese New Year is an important event in the supply chain. It marks factory holidays in China and this year it starts earlier from 22 January and goes on till the 5^th of February.

The Hamburg-based ‘Container xChange’, a leading online logistics platform, conducted their annual Chinese New Year survey which witnessed some 2,300 respondents this year from the supply chain industry sharing their opinions and views about how they view Chinese New Year and COVID outbreaks in China to have an impact on global supply chains.

Here are a few interesting insights from the results – 

• As compared to some 66% in 2022, there was an increase in the percentage (73%) of supply chain professionals expecting Chinese New Year to further disrupt the shipping industry this year.
• This comes in contrast to industry reports where a lot of analysts talk about lessening of the impact of disruptions in China on the global supply chains.
• Out of the 73% saying that they do foresee an impact, 65% were freight forwarders and the rest were supply chain professionals in general.
• ‘Ordering inventories in advance’ is still the time-tested strategy to future-proof disruptions caused by Chinese New Year shutdowns
• 2023 Chinese New Year to have a different set of challenges for supply chain professionals; Technology to be a key differentiator for ensuring visibility and reliability

Marex Media