The UK government has launched the Critical Imports and Supply Chains Strategy to boost supply chain resilience for critical goods entering the country.
The rise in disruptions to the global supply chains following the pandemic, wars in Ukraine and the Middle East, the Red Sea and Panama Canal have also led many shippers to re-route goods movements, adding significant time and costs to shipments.
“Imported goods are vital to our economy. They ensure lower prices, greater choice, and help businesses to be more productive and also enable innovation, drive growth, and are essential to the UK’s world-leading industries, from aerospace to life sciences. With this strategy we’re equipping business, so they no longer have to rely on unpredictable partners for supplies of the goods that keep our country going. By making supply chains stronger we’re helping make the UK a truly safe and reliable place to do business.”
Nusrat Ghani, minister for industry and economic security, is launching the strategy at an event hosted at Heathrow Airport.
“Having a dedicated import strategy, bringing business into the process of advising and informing policy, [combined with the ongoing digitalisation of trade,] will help our manufacturers and our supply chains boost resilience at a time of growing global instability.”
The government also says that the strategy will include “cutting-edge research” that “will be used to map the impacts of shocks on supply chains and understand how the UK can secure the goods we need in future.”