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Adapting supply chain operations in anticipation of and during the COVID-19 pandemic
Journal article   Open access   Peer reviewed

Adapting supply chain operations in anticipation of and during the COVID-19 pandemic

Maxim Rozhkov, Dmitry Ivanov, Jennifer Blackhurst and Anand Nair
Omega (Oxford), Vol.110, pp.102635-102635
07/01/2022
DOI: 10.1016/j.omega.2022.102635
PMCID: PMC8898197
PMID: 35291412
url
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.omega.2022.102635View
Published (Version of record) Open Access

Abstract

•Impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on supply chains are analysed.•Proactive, adaptive operational decisions are examined.•We contribute to the understanding of the preparedness and recovery decisions.•We combine pandemic dynamics, supply chain design, and operational dynamics. This article investigates the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic and their proactive mediation by adaptive operational decisions in different network design structures in anticipation of and during the pandemic. In generalized terms, we contribute to the understanding of the effect of preparedness and recovery decisions in a pandemic setting on supply chain operations and performance. In particular, we examine the impact of inventory pre-positioning in anticipation of a pandemic and the adaptation of production-ordering policy during the pandemic. Our model combines three levels, which is not often seen jointly in operations management literature, i.e., pandemic dynamics, supply chain design, and operational production-inventory control policies. The analysis is performed for both two- and three-stage supply chains and different scenarios for pandemic dynamics (i.e., uncontrolled propagation or controlled dispersal with lockdowns). Our findings suggest that two-stage supply chains exhibit a higher vulnerability in disruption cases. However, they are exposed to a lower system inertia and show positive effects at the recovery stage. Supply chain adaptation ahead of a pandemic is more advantageous than during the pandemic when specific operational recovery policies are deployed. We show that it is instructive to avoid simultaneous changes in structural network design and operational policies since that can destabilize the production-inventory system and result in higher product shortages.
COVID-19 pandemic Disruption Preparedness Recovery Simulation Supply chain

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