The United States is preparing for its next supply chain crisis by ensuring that enough domestic production will at least partially meet demand for critical raw materials like microchips, President Joe Biden's economic adviser Brian Deese said on Wednesday
WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 23rd June, 2021) The United States is preparing for its next supply chain crisis by ensuring that enough domestic production will at least partially meet demand for critical raw materials like microchips, President Joe Biden's economic adviser Brian Deese said on Wednesday.
"Today, we're living through real-time bottlenecks in the semiconductor industry that ... we're working to try to resolve those in the very immediate term, but the real answer for the US is to build resilience by building back domestic capability, not to source all semiconductors here in the United States but have enough capacity here, enough innovation here and enough production here that we don't find ourselves exposed," Deese said in a discussion hosted by the Atlantic Council.
Deese acknowledged that the current semiconductor shortage caused by the coronavirus pandemic restrictions might take years to resolve, but added it prompted the White House to plan to be better prepared when the next crisis strikes in another five to eight years.
US supply chains are struggling with near record-low inventories of homes and cars, as complications caused by the coronavirus pandemic restrictive measures leaving manufacturers with ten days less supply than a year ago for most goods, according to the White House report.
The inventory deficit in microchips, framing lumber, wallboard and roofing materials was withholding business activity across industries from automaking to homebuilding, the report said.
Deese said it will take public investment and coordination between the public and private sector to tackle the issue.
"The goal is over five years from now, eight years from now, we put ourselves in a situation where when the next crisis, or the next set of challenges, inevitably hits, we're operating from a much stronger foundation," Deese added.
