Supply Chain issues

[The Heretic]

Weak links in finance and supply chains are easily weaponized

Russian sanctions highlight how network analysis is urgently needed to find and protect vulnerable parts of the global economy.

www.nature.com

 

[The Heretic]

India bans wheat exports to try and tame prices as a scorching heatwave curtailed output

The world's second-biggest wheat producer is trying to bring down local prices.

www.cnbc.com

 

[The Heretic]

At some point in the future I may replace my current "daily" driver with an electric vehicle, but since I retired I only drive infrequently (lately mostly to trade/buy guns, but that should taper off now) as I do not commute. I intend to add/build solar capacity with a battery store when I sell this property and buy/build anew. I should have adequate capacity to recharge an electric vehicle from the solar power, especially in the summer. I only drive about 100-200 miles per month on average.

However, at the current rate of use, I will probably get too old to drive before my daily driver wears out.

I do have two utility vehicles - my Toyota pickup and my Dodge flatbed - which get used maybe 10 times a year for moving things around on my property (yarding logs, stacking firewood, etc.) and sometimes going into town to haul something that won't fit in my SUV. I use maybe a gallon a month on average.

So I added it up using transactions from my card accounts.

Last year I fueled my vehicles 17 times and spent ~$600 on fuel. This included filling the 37 gal tank on my diesel truck (I have not used it since, so it remains full and accounts for over $100 of the yearly expense), and occasionally filling some 5 gallon gas cans to use for other equipment (gensets, mowers, chainsaws, etc.). On average that is fueling my daily driver once every three weeks.

This year to date, I have so far spent $215 on gasoline, only for my daily driver. I have fueled it 5 times so far, the last fill on Friday cost $71 because I filled the 16 gal tank when it was almost empty.

 

[OldBroad44]

India bans wheat exports to try and tame prices as a scorching heatwave curtailed output

The world's second-biggest wheat producer is trying to bring down local prices.

www.cnbc.com

Actually, while India grows a lot of wheat it usually exports little. They eat it themselves. Had India allowed traders to export their (government-subsidized) wheat because of high prices in the international markets Indians would likely have had to pay much more for local wheat, many poor Indians might have actually starved to death.

I've read that in famine years, forbidding exports is the most effective thing a government can do to keep prices from going so high people starve. Attempts to control prices tend to result in a black market and are difficult to enforce because every hungry or starving person or family and every wheat grower or seller are the violators--pretty much everyone. But to ban exports merely requires the government to inspect ships or check roads leaving the country and deter those few involved in exporting grain.

The Irish potato famine happened not just because the potato crop failed. Irish peasants usually grew oats and potatoes and kept a milk cow on the commons. Oaten bread and porridge and potatoes and milk, butter, and cheese is a good diet. When the potatoes failed the locally controlled government banned export of oats and peasants survived on oats and milk and butter and cheese. Then British landlords gained control of the land and started enclosing it and grazing sheep. That is, they seized the commons and cancelled the rights of peasants to use it. And they didn't need as much peasant labor on their own land when it was growing sheep instead of grain. What made the Great Potato Famine lethal was not merely failure of the potato crop, which had happened before with no one starving. It was the British landlords also seizing the commons and also the Parliament in London not allowing banning of oat exports. They actually discussed it and acknowledged that not banning oat exports during a potato famine meant thousands of Irish peasant families would die. They decided to do it anyway because they didn't need so much peasant labor anymore, and the Irish peasants had too many children and reproduced too fast they thought. In other words, the British landlords and Parliament in London used the potato crop failure to commit deliberate genocide on the Irish peasant population. A million Irish died. Another million managed to emigrate to America and elsewhere. Including one of my ancestors. So much for the joys of being a British colony and depending on the mercy of a government in London.

In 1997 Tony Blair, then PM of UK, formally apologized for how Britain dealt with Ireland during the the Irish Potato Famine. The 1/8 Irish part of my soul is somewhat appeased.

 

[RicInOR]

Gun Owners Need to Think Like Supply Chain Managers Before the Next Ammo Shortage

Gun Owners Need to Think Like Supply Chain Managers Before the Next Ammo Shortage - The Truth About Guns

By Andrew Balthrop, Ron Gordon, and Doug Voss During the two years that COVID-19 has altered American life, we have seen shortages of goods ranging from toilet paper and N95 masks to semiconductors and new cars. The supply chain disruptions that fueled those shortages often followed a general...

www.thetruthaboutguns.com

 

[The Heretic]

World has just 10 weeks' worth of wheat left after Ukraine war

Food supplies are being rocked by Russia's invasion of the 'breadbasket of Europe'

www.telegraph.co.uk

 

[nammac]

World has just 10 weeks' worth of wheat left after Ukraine war

Food supplies are being rocked by Russia's invasion of the 'breadbasket of Europe'

www.telegraph.co.uk

Time to stock on wheat based basis as well as flour and yeast…

On another note, perhaps this is punishment from above for all the evils the good ole USA has perpetrated not only around the world, but right here at home.

Thank God I finally got that major pay raise last year. At least I can better weather this economic crisis.

 

[Jay Walk]

I'm not an "Insane Person" but I play one on the InterWebs.

 

[Provincial]

It seems that China is shutting down because of Covid. This is shutting down manufacturing there. Expect shipments from China to dry up in the coming months.

China has shut off exports of phosphate fertilizer, so American farmers will see even tighter supplies of fertilizer than the Ukrainian War has brought about.

Here is a link to a You Tube report. Keep watching for the whole 11 minutes to see a report from the Eisenhower School with more background.

The End of Chinese Manufacturing

 

[The Heretic]

https://www.reddit.com/r/preppers/comments/v38968

Yet another case of public ignorance on these issues. The people responding on this reddit thread think that you can just flip a switch on diesel OTR trucks and the problem of DEF goes away.

 

[2506]

You guys realize that one of the major and only manufacturers of contrast dye is in China?
Unless you're actively having a stroke, you've got a long wait.

Need a CT scan? You may have to wait weeks, thanks to lockdowns in China and dye shortages

Because of COVID-19 restrictions, a critical Shanghai plant that produces the dye has been operating at reduced capacity for weeks.

www.marketplace.org

 

[arakboss]

You guys realize that one of the major and only manufacturers of contrast dye is in China?
Unless you're actively having a stroke, you've got a long wait.

Need a CT scan? You may have to wait weeks, thanks to lockdowns in China and dye shortages

Because of COVID-19 restrictions, a critical Shanghai plant that produces the dye has been operating at reduced capacity for weeks.

www.marketplace.org

If one good thing comes from covid besides big profits for big pharma, I hope it is a lesson learned about diversifying sources for everything.

 

[The Heretic]

If one good thing comes from covid besides big profits for big pharma, I hope it is a lesson learned about diversifying sources for everything.

That and "Just In Time" may be good for profits, but it sucks for emergencies and supply disruptions.

Also, having some "home based" sources for key supplies/etc., is probably a good thing too.

 

[Diamondback]

https://www.reddit.com/r/preppers/comments/v38968

Yet another case of public ignorance on these issues. The people responding on this reddit thread think that you can just flip a switch on diesel OTR trucks and the problem of DEF goes away.

Some of this is also corporate-politics, since Flying J is a sister company to UP archrival BNSF under Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway.

 

[2506]

That and "Just In Time" may be good for profits, but it sucks for emergencies and supply disruptions.

Also, having some "home based" sources for key supplies/etc., is probably a good thing too.

This, 100%. Firms have been running lean for decades with wiley MBA's showing greedy CEO's how to maximize investor (short term) gains.

Who could have seen the intersection of JIT inventory + lengthening & offshoring the supply chain causing such a catastrophe? It seems like a great idea on paper and in the boardroom. Reality is showing is the flaws.

 

[Provincial]

We have been living in the age of what I call the "pump and jump" CEO. These CEO's are focused on short-term profits at the expense of long-term prosperity. They want to create a jump in stock price (which is used as a measure of their success) in order to make their resume look better. They have no long-term connection to the current employer, and are always looking to jump up the ladder to another company that will make their resume look better. After they jump, they do the same sort of short-term actions and repeat the process.

For some reason, they are not held accountable for the problems they leave behind for their successors. Corporate boards seem to be rubber stamps for the executives, and all drink from the same batch of tainted Kool-Aid!

 

[arakboss]

We use to have pantries and freezers that were filled with real food. Now people want fresh this, fresh that which is like JIT for peoples kitchens. Canned and frozen foods are now looked on as poor peoples food.

 

[Mono1]

This, 100%. Firms have been running lean for decades with wiley MBA's showing greedy CEO's how to maximize investor (short term) gains.

Who could have seen the intersection of JIT inventory + lengthening & offshoring the supply chain causing such a catastrophe? It seems like a great idea on paper and in the boardroom. Reality is showing is the flaws.

Correct. The Japanese developed the JIT concept and exploited it greatly during the 1980's, becoming a Business Management Role Model for the World. The consequences arrived in 1990, after the Nikkei topped out at 38,957 in late 1989, as the business cycle re-asserted its natural influence.

After more than 30 years, the Nikkei has still not regained that 1989 level. Not even close.

 

[American123]

This, 100%. Firms have been running lean for decades with wiley MBA's showing greedy CEO's how to maximize investor (short term) gains.

Who could have seen the intersection of JIT inventory + lengthening & offshoring the supply chain causing such a catastrophe? It seems like a great idea on paper and in the boardroom. Reality is showing is the flaws.

Not responding to you directly, just using it as a springboard:

It's easy to bash corporations and not think bigger picture.

Inventory is taxed, government whether it is federal, state, county or city, taxes inventory businesses keep on hand. Hence why businesses are incentivized to hold "just enough" in inventory and not have any significant surplus because they will be taxed on it if they do. In one manner or another, government (and their policies) are often the source of any given problem.

 

[Mono1]

Inventory is taxed, government whether it is federal, state, county or city, taxes inventory businesses keep on hand.

Appreciate your post. But I'm not clear about how inventory is "taxed". It is clear that money which is tied up in excess inventory certainly could be used for better purposes if that level of inventory can be reduced to some minimum level by freeing up working capital for other purposes. And hence the inducement for JIT principles.

But I think if there is any government "tax" on just holding inventory, it would be inconsequential.