Introduction: The year 2022 has been called the “Year of Supply Chain Value”, and the epidemic has highlighted the importance of the supply chain, with the demand and awareness of the industry and the public at an all-time high. The stability and reliability of the supply chain has received attention from all parties. Spot trading venues, mass supply chain service enterprises, e-commerce platforms, etc. are improving their supply chain management level through intelligent transformation and forging the overall resilience of the supply chain to cope with the unpredictable changes of the times.

In the year just passed, global supply chains have moved forward amidst pandemics and pandemics, but trends point to more uncertainty in global supply chain management extending into 2023, whether it be existing or new geopolitical conflicts, inflationary pressures and recessionary environments, climate change weather events, or other issues yet to emerge. As the gloom of the epidemic fades and 2023 ushers in a new dawn, there will also be key supply chain trends that need to be managed in order to capitalize on strategic opportunities in the midst of the crisis.

Supply Chain Trends 2023: Visualization, Collaboration, Sustainability

The rising importance of supply chain management

With the convening of the “Twentieth National Congress”, “supply chain security” has been elevated to the level of macro national security system for the first time, and then the National Development and Reform Commission said that it will strengthen the monitoring and early warning of the risk of security and stability of the supply chain of the important industrial chain in 2023, and the security of the supply chain has been elevated to an unprecedented high level. unprecedented height.

On January 1, 2023, the Act on Corporate Due Diligence Obligations in Supply Chain (hereinafter referred to as the Supply Chain Act) officially came into force in Germany. Supply chain management, especially supply chain social responsibility management or due diligence management/due diligence, will directly affect enterprises' participation in the global value chain and their competitiveness.

From an international perspective, if Chinese enterprises want to cooperate with multinational corporations, they need to respond to the supply chain due diligence of multinational corporations and implement the various requirements of the other party. For many domestic enterprises that are at the key control point of the global industrial chain, the social responsibility requirements they face are constantly rising, on the one hand, the social responsibility they have to bear as suppliers of European and American enterprises, and on the other hand, the due diligence responsibility for their own suppliers.

From a domestic perspective, supply chain management is related to the security and stability of the industrial chain supply chain. After the epidemic, many enterprises have difficulties in operation, and many of the problems are in the blocked supply chain. Enterprises need to better understand their suppliers through supply chain management to grasp supplier information and control costs; at the same time, they also need to strengthen the risk assessment and control of suppliers, transfer social responsibility requirements layer by layer, do a good job of due diligence management, and work with suppliers to cope with various types of uncertain risks and enhance competitiveness.

Transparent supply chain helps enterprises to predict and mitigate risks

In a world that has become more volatile and unpredictable, supply chains are in constant danger of disruption. Businesses cannot control the consequences of weather, political outcomes or unprecedented epidemics, but they can determine how their supply chains respond to these challenges. For example, if raw materials come from a region that is politically unstable, a business can source them from another region. If changes occur, companies can immediately adjust and mitigate the impact of disruptions. Strategies that anticipate bottlenecks and plan ahead can help companies minimize the risk of supply chain disruptions.

Transparency and visibility, or the ability to trace components or goods from the manufacturer to the subsequent processing facility or end user, are the most critical elements of supply chain management. In order to strengthen the entire supply chain, more visibility provides a better understanding of the overall state of the supply chain as well as the status of individual links. In addition, visibility ensures that all stakeholders, including customers and internal parties, have easy access to data. With a more transparent supply chain, many potential risks, such as order errors leading to delivery delays, can be minimized and bottlenecks can be dealt with more quickly.

Low carbon will become an important area of corporate responsibility

The introduction of the “dual-carbon” goal has accelerated the low-carbon transformation of Chinese enterprises, and the gradual increase of low-carbon requirements for enterprises in Europe and the United States, such as the EU carbon border adjustment mechanism, has prompted the low-carbon economy to become a new territory for global competition. Whether operating domestically or exporting to the EU, there is a need to further increase carbon reduction efforts.

Many financial institutions have also focused their ESG investments on low-carbon areas or combined carbon reduction with financing, further promoting the importance of carbon reduction.

In addition to reducing their own carbon emissions through technological innovation and energy transformation, companies need to focus on carbon reduction in the supply chain. In addition to practical carbon reduction, the importance of carbon disclosure is also increasing.

With the requirements of the state and enterprises for carbon neutral targets, suppliers that have not built a perfect carbon management system will be gradually eliminated in the process of industrial upgrading, and enterprises have a strong internal and external impetus to improve the carbon management system, which will further accelerate the process of carbon reduction in the upstream and downstream of the supply chain.