According to the Maersk’s expert opinion article published on September 30, 2022, Patricia Perez Salazar, general director of the Central America Area at Maersk, participated in the first Regional Meeting organized by the Council of Global Companies and the Mexican Association of Secretaries of Economic Development, speaking at the Nearshoring and local supply chain dialogue table.
The meeting and the dialogue table in which Patricia participated, focused on supply chains and how Maersk has supported maintaining the supply in the regional market, and how these strategies have become critical activities for global companies.
In recent years, debates have intensified on the transformation of distribution and supply chains due to trade protectionism, the interruption of supply chains as a result of the pandemic, and, at the same time, a race for economic reactivation that exceeded the capacity of production due to bio sanitary protocols, the availability of means of transport, port congestion and the appetite of consumers for new products.
Lately, there has been a shortage of critical components, an increase in shipping times, and a disproportionate increase in transportation prices that have affected the production and supply of goods. Companies with global operations have had to rethink their sourcing strategies and mitigate risk to reduce their vulnerability to external shocks and have even seen changes in geopolitical conditions.
Patricia Salazar Perez, at the dialogue table, spoke about the trends that will redefine the chains and business models from now on. The general director of the Central America Area at Maersk mentioned 3 key points:
- Bring logistics as a critical and strategic activity to business
- Vertical integration of production chains, integrate them in the planning and traceability of the supply chain
- E-commerce as a logistics transformer
At the Regional Meeting, it was also made clear that a large window of opportunity has opened for the region to attract new production chains and strengthen existing ones. Exalting the benefits of the region such as the adequate endowment of factors of production and labor, geographic location, size and proximity to large markets, more solid institutions, and a wide network of trade and investment agreements, among others.
It was concluded that for nearshoring it is essential to have strategic allies that share the same plan and that provide visibility at all times of the supply chain, creating these strategic alliances will help maintain competitiveness in the region and continue with the regional development plan, looking for a regional standardization.
