Supply Chain Breakdowns And How To Prep For Them

A “systems collapse” is imminent because of a worldwide supply chain breakdown – so reads the alarming news in Business Insider on the 30^th of September 2021. Alarm is the right word for it since supply chain breakdowns can bring all manner of difficulties, challenges, and emergencies in their train.

Let’s take a look at how serious things could become – and how you can be prepared:

Major issues

There is some sort of supply chain involved in everything we consume – from the food we eat, the water drunk, the medicine taken, and the fuel used to heat our homes and power our transport.

Everything has to be transported from wherever it is harvested, extracted, processed, or manufactured. Getting it from A to B is part of the supply chain. Worse than that, the modern world has seen increasing connectivity of different supply chains, so that disruption to one spreads in a chain reaction to others. What can start as a minor ripple builds up into a whole tidal wave. As the website City Prepping put it in a blog on the 21^st of August 2021, “tiny tremors lead to major earthquakes”.

With one supply chain or another responsible for satisfying every small and large demand, a disruption or breakdown can have calamitous effects. Breakdowns like this can create shortages of just about every daily necessity.

Electricity and gas

Nexus Energy Solutions explains that most of the fuel used to generate electricity and supply gas-fired utilities comes from natural gas, which accounts for approximately 41% of the UK’s total consumption. Around 13% is produced by conventional coal-fired power stations and modern nuclear plants. An increasing proportion – currently, 30% – comes from renewable sources.

Whether from fossil fuels or sustainable energy, however, several supply chains come into play when generating electricity and arranging its distribution. If that energy is generated overseas – and imports in August of 2021 accounted for 15% of the country’s consumption, according to the Nuclear Industry Association (NIA) on the 5^th of August – then supply chains are naturally stretched still further.

Energy Prepping

• probably the best way of preparing for a breakdown in the supply of electricity or gas is to get used to consuming less in the first place;

• there is a limit to that, of course, and these forms of energy are relatively difficult to store;

• you might consider switching some appliances to run on cylinders of liquid propane gas (LPG) – you could preserve cooking, lighting, and even heating requirements from this source;

• your ability to store LPG for domestic use is limited – a maximum of 15 kg (2 cylinders in use) and a further 15 kg stored indoors while there are strict Health and Safety Executive (HSE) rules on the storage of cylinders outdoors and you might need to meet any local authority regulations about such storage;

• for longer-term prepping, you might want to consider investing in sustainable energy generation – through wind or solar power, for example;

• a cheaper, less environmentally-friendly, alternative is to invest in your own petrol-fuelled mobile generator – but then you’ll face the risk of fuel supply breakdowns.

Fuel

To a very mild degree, the UK has recently experienced the effects of a supply chain breakdown when it comes to the scarcity of petrol and diesel fuel for our cars. An article in the Guardian newspaper on the 28^th of September 2021 quoted the Prime Minister’s belief that shortages due to this breakdown could last for months.

This incident illustrates the extent to which supply chains are interwoven – with closed petrol stations the result of a combination of the shortage of delivery drivers, sickness absences because of the coronavirus pandemic, and panic buying on the part of motorists.

Fuel Prepping

• as with other sources of energy, the best means of preparation probably lies in getting used to consuming less fuel – and petrol in particular;

• any motorised transport, however, is almost certain to depend on your access to diesel or petrol supplies so that means maximising your storage capacity;

• you can store a maximum of just 30 litres (6.5 gallons) of petrol at home and a further 30 litres in any vehicle (in addition to the fuel already in the tank);

• therefore, aim to keep the fuel tanks full in all your vehicles (even those not often used) – in any emergency, transferring fuel between vehicles as necessary;

• if you want to store more than that relatively small volume, you can apply for permission from your local Petroleum Enforcement Authority (PEA) to store up to 275 litres (60.5 gallons).

Water

The water that comes out of your tap may be in danger of being taken for granted but also relies on the integrity of supply chains built on a complicated and comprehensive infrastructure, the delivery of essential supplies to treatment plants, and the availability of drivers to man those deliveries.

Supply chain consultants Achilles have identified threats to the existing supply chain and network infrastructure in the UK arising largely from climate change, a steadily widening digital economy, and an ageing population.

Water Prepping

• prepping for any breakdown in the supply of water needs to be at the heart of your planning – simply because you’re going to continue to need lots of it for drinking, cooking, washing, and cleaning;

• your emergency stores will already comprise as much bottled water as you can manage;

• ensure that your domestic water storage tank is operating to its maximum capacity and that it remains fully topped up – consider investing in further water storage tanks;

• when domestic supplies are at risk of running out, you’ll need to find alternative sources of water – which, as we recognised in our blog on the 23^rd of June can be extremely difficult in any urban setting;

• as you cast your net further afield and consider more dubious water sources, remember the importance of water purification tablets

• if you haven’t got one already, consider a water butt. The water (which isn’t typically drinkable straight from the butt of course) can be used for watering an allotment etc. Or look into rainwater harvesting.

Medicine

The Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry (ABPI) recognises the extent to which patients rely on the efficient and timely delivery of the medicines they need – in many cases, simply to stay alive. Yet – despite the best efforts of everyone throughout the industry, admits the ABPI, supply problems can happen for unforeseen reasons.

At other times, those reasons may be clearer than ever – as the pharmaceutical industry has recently gone into overdrive attempting to maintain normal supply chains in the face of the coronavirus pandemic.

Medicines Prepping

• no one is going to suggest that you turn to making your own medicines in any emergency – notions of self-medication can only lead you into more serious trouble;

• although the prescriptions you receive from your doctor naturally limit the number of drugs you receive at any one time, make a point of extending that period for as long as possible – a prescription for two or three months, for example, rather than a single month;

• in that way, you can build up a stock of essential medicine to meet your needs at least in the short to medium-term – bearing in mind that all drugs will have an expiry date.

Food

The food supply chain in the UK was described as “resilient” by the Food and Drink Federation (FDF) in an interview with the BBC on the 10^th of September and the country was unlikely to run out of food – not yet anyway.

Even so, the FDF warned that changes to existing supply chains meant that food shortages could certainly become a permanent feature in the future.

The current woes appear to have arisen from several factors including the shortage of lorry drivers, changes to tax regimes and the effects of the pandemic making it more difficult to attract temporary drivers from the EU, and the competition for drivers from other parts of the supply chain – such as Amazon and online supermarkets.

Food Prepping

• prepping for a possible breakdown in food supply chains depends on your stock-piling your own supplies;

• the amount you store will depend on the space available, the suitability of that space for the storage of food, and your careful selection of the food with the longest shelf-life;

• our blog on the 20^th of September discussed some of the issues around prepping for any shortages of food.

Summary

When they are working – which has been for most of the time in recent decades – supply chains work so smoothly and seamlessly that their existence barely registers in normal consciousness.

Yet recent events have shown that many supply chains – and the interconnected network of global supply chains – are extremely fragile and anything but certain.

Think on that as you continue your prepping – and know that any supply chain may suffer a breakdown and leave you with severe failings and challenges that need to be remedied.