Topic: 2024-Supply Chain Stability
Country: Sierra Leone
Delegate Name: Adelaide Woltil
Topic: 2024-Supply Chain Stability
Country: Sierra Leone
Delegate Name: Adelaide Woltil
Adelaide Woltil
The Republic of Sierra Leone
Supply Chain Stability
Special Political Committee
Forest Hills Central High School
COVID-19 unequivocably shook confidence in national trade and the long-term functionality of our deep-rooted reliance on the supply chain. The issue in the supply chain caused by the COVID-19 outbreak was due to a lack of workers, exponential growth in demand, and a lack of safe and reliable transportation under the threat of a widespread virus. Some of these issues can be seen through the lack of toilet paper in the U.S. due to overconsumption in fear of running out. This same thing occurred on a global scale with numerous products, bankrupting some companies and majorly wounding workers who were put out of jobs. In early April 2020, the UN created the COVID-19 Supply Chain Taskforce, coordinated by the World Health Organization (WHO), to help ease the transportation and production of essential goods. This included helping to have medical necessities and supplies delivered internationally and biochemical testing done to ensure safety without the transfer of disease (Supply Chain Taskforce). The five essential parts of the supply chain are planning, sourcing, manufacturing, transporting, and distributing goods, and without all five parts functioning and operating smoothly with precautionary measures in place for potential incidents, the chain becomes susceptible to breakdowns and hitches in the process that hinder, manufacturers, consumers, and nations as well as the global economy (Supply Chain Sustainability).
As a strong mining and agriculturally based nation, Sierra Leone mainly exports minerals, diamonds specifically, and crops, cocoa and coffee being the largest agricultural exports. After our nation’s civil war from 1991 to 2002, we struggled with a prolonged period of economic hardship. Our mineral exports allowed us to gain revenue and slowly build our GDP through exports and trade. COVID-19 incapacitated much of the production and exporting facets of our system and hindered us significantly in trade while capping our revenue due to our inability. The pandemic resulted in delayed deliveries, reduced production, and the total halt of some output due to lockdowns and restrictions. The initial lockdowns also led to a rush to secure water supply and an increase in demand for essential goods, but due to breakdowns in the supply chain we were unable to efficiently deliver these goods. Sierra Leone is highly susceptible to massive declines in the economy and an increase in poverty due to the volatile state of the nation after both the civil war and COVID-19, so measures to ensure no breakdowns as significant as those during COVID are strongly desirable (Sierra Leone: Selected Issues).
Sierra Leone proposes that we individually strengthen each process of the supply chain to ensure that it functions smoothly as an entity and doesn’t result in massive breakdowns, as seen during COVID. For planning, we propose that businesses have a mandatory program in place in case of emergencies that assures workers’ jobs to help halt unemployment rates, capping out prices to ensure that essential goods will be necessary at a reasonable price, and a bankruptcy plan where essential businesses can rely on government stipends to stay in business under times of stress. Sierra Leone encourages the UN to implement policies to regulate rises and falls in the economy that affect the supply chain, such as reinforcing exports and imports to keep the global trade economy strong and lowering unemployment rates to help the working class adversely affected by global breakdowns. Diversification of production and trading is also necessary to ensure that the same hindering reliability during COVID-19 doesn’t occur again, given that another crisis adversely affects the economy and the global state. Assuring high standards, reasonable prices, safe methods of production and trade, and regulating economic dips will help ensure that the supply chain remains stable through times of international emergency and help the overall global economy for the bettering of all nations.
Sources:
United Nations COVID-19 Response
https://www.un.org/en/coronavirus/supply-chain-and-covid-19-un-rushes-move-vital-equipment-frontlines#:~:text=In%20early%20April%2C%20the%20United,equipment%20like%20ventilators%20and%20oxygen
United Nations Global Compact Supply Chain Sustainability
https://unglobalcompact.org/what-is-gc/our-work/supply-chain
IMF Library: Sierra Leone: Selected Issues
https://www.elibrary.imf.org/view/journals/002/2022/260/article-A003-en.xml#:~:text=In%20Sierra%20Leone%2C%20the%20pandemic,(Komeh%20and%20Sesay%202021).
