India epidemic will aggravate global supply shortage
[shipping]
According to the data provided by the United Nations Conference on World Trade and development, about 80% of the world's trade freight volume is transported by sea. Guye praten, Secretary General of the international shipping association, said more than 200000 of the world's 1.7 million sailors came from India. Many of these Indian sailors took up positions requiring important skills.
CNN quoted praten as saying that he "hopes" that the epidemic in India can be alleviated, otherwise it will lead to a shortage of sailors and "interfere with the global supply chain".
With some countries banning flights from India, it will be difficult for Indian sailors to reach ports around the world. During the global spread of COVID-19 last year, nearly 200 thousand seaman remained in detention for months, calling their boats "floating prisons".
[Medicine]
In addition to affecting shipping, COVID-19 India will drag on the supply of medicines. More than 60% of the vaccines on sale in the world are produced in India. The Serum Institute of India is the world's largest producer of vaccines.
The Serum Institute of India agreed last year to produce up to 200 million doses of new crown vaccine for about 90 countries and regions. However, given that only 2% of India's population has been vaccinated, the government of India and the Serum Institute now give priority to providing vaccines to their citizens.
Meanwhile, according to CNN, India is the world's largest supplier of generic drugs; Ninety percent of all prescriptions in the United States are generic.
[textile]
India is one of the largest textile exporters. The industry is now suffering from a severe labor shortage.
According to the data provided by wozier consulting company, in Delhi and Bangalore, the garment industry's labor absence rate is as high as 50%; Last year, the consumption and export of Indian clothing industry decreased by 30% and 24% respectively.
"The 2021 figures are difficult to predict now because we are not sure when the epidemic will end," wozier said
Financial services
In the past few decades, some large international banks and accounting firms have transferred a large number of information technology and operation jobs to India.
Nearly 4.4 million people in India work in information technology and business process management, according to the National Association of software and service companies.
Some enterprises have taken measures to reduce the impact of the epidemic in India, such as transferring related jobs to other countries, encouraging employees to work at home, or delaying the deadline for all kinds of work. But if employees need to take care of their sick family members, even if they work from home, it is still not easy to complete the work. In addition, processing sensitive enterprise and customer data at home faces security and data protection challenges.
