Supply Chain Risk Management under Covid-19: A Review and

Research Agenda

Arash Shahin
Department of Management, University of Isfahan, Isfahan, Iran
shahin@ase.ui.ac.ir

Abstract
A general literature review has been made on 35 papers (published 2019-2020) with a focus on
studying supply chain risk management under Covid-19. Out of the collected papers, 24 papers
were recognized as the main references of this paper and were directly related to the subject of
this study; they were all published in 2020. The most important difference of the global pandemic
compared to the other types of supply chain threats is that the impact of Covid-19 remains for a
long time. While there are relatively sufficient resources on the concept of supply chain
resilience, less resource is available on the other subjects of stability, robustness and viability.
Although supply chain viability is relatively a new concept in supply chain risk management,
according to the vulnerability cycle and the zone of viability, in order for a supply chain to be
viable, it should also be stable, resilient and robust.
Keywords: Supply chain risk management, Covid-19, Stability, Resilience, Robustness,
Viability

1. Introduction
The Corona-virus (COVID-19) has had a significant impact on supply chains (Shokrani et al.,
2020). This global pandemic has influenced all aspects of supply chains; from the supply of raw
materials and the availability of labour to the transportation of goods and the operation of retail
channels (Bhattacharya, 2020; Gao and Ren, 2020). The growth of global economy is decreasing
and companies are facing decreasing demand and stoppage in their processes (Szymkowski,
2020). Corona-virus pandemic also exhibits severe economic consequences worldwide (IMF,
2020; Habel et al., 2020). Unemployment rates are rising everyday (Hall, 2020; Rushe and

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Aratani, 2020), customer demand is decreasing, and supply chains are facing critical problems as
countries increasingly close their borders (Buchholz, 2020; Salcedo et al., 2020).
The Corona-virus has influenced all countries that suffered supply and demand shocks. Many
firms, both large and small, have struggled to continue to exist during the pandemic, and this will
certainly focus attention on the obvious failings of their earlier business models and also on how
to make superior resilience in the future (Strange, 2020).
SCM risks have been studied for a long time, but pandemic-related problems brought new SCM
risk discussions (Esper, 2020). Amid this global tragedy, supply chain risk is a keyword that
media and practitioners are continuously recognizing in their assessment of the effects on
businesses, implying the significant yet challenging risk mitigation in supply chains (Pournader
et al., 2020).
According to Gray (2020), there is an increasing need for i) continuous supply chain monitoring
and industry commitment; ii) proactive strategy development to handle absenteeism and other
supply chain’s potential threats; and iii) feasibility of additional public resources to provide better
pickup and delivery services.
This paper is typically a literature review paper. The author has made an attempt to study almost
all of the available resources on supply chain management under Covid-19 and to provide a
comprehensive picture of the subject. For this purpose, in the following, the effects of the virus
on supply chains are addressed. Then, the cycle model of supply chain vulnerability is
demonstrated. Based on the cycle, the supply chain risk management strategies are introduced,
followed by discussion and conclusions.

2. Methodology
Initially, a total of 35 papers were identified based on a search on the two keywords of “supply
chain risk” and “Covid-19 or Coronavirus” together, until June 2020. All of the 35 papers wer
published in 2019 and 2020. A paper was included if it contained the mentioned keywords in the
title, abstract or list of keywords of the paper. The literature review included journal papers only;
therefore, publications such as books and dissertations were not included and only papers
published in English were included. Papers were retrieved from databases of the following six
leading publishers: ScienceDirect, Springer, Taylor & Francis, Emerald, Wiley and Sage. After
monitoring the collected papers, 24 were recognized as more suitable and as the major sources of
this general review. All of the 24 papers were published in 2020. However, the rest, i.e. 11 papers
were also used and cited, but they were not recognized as the main references of this study.
Although no limit was set to the study period, in practice, the year 2020 established itself as only
year of the study period as the terms ‘supply chain risk’ and ‘Covid-19 or Coronavirus’ were
coined in that year, simultaneously. However, all-inclusive input of date was continued to the end
of June 2020. The 24 papers were categorised into five categories: stability (3), robustness (4),

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resilience (9), viability (1) and a generic category of the concepts related to the influence of
Covid-19 on supply chain risk management (7).

3. The effect of Covid-19 on supply chains

According to Trautrims et al. (2020), Covid-19 might have three effects on a supply chain. They
include sudden demand surges, outdated stock, and workers problems. In a recent Harvard
Business Review (HBR) article, three ways have been expressed by which the virus will
influence businesses i) direct influence on consumer confidence; ii) indirect impact on confidence
(wealth effect); and iii) supply-side shock. The first two directly influence consumer and business
demand and the third results in supply disruptions. Supply disruptions in turn will take a longer
time to stabilize due to amplified instability. For the time being, the lack of proactive
coordination is reducing the confidence of citizens, consumers and businesses. This will in turn
make it difficult to resolve the problem. Strong feedback loops (violent cycles) add force to this
process making the situation increasingly worse. Based on the Theory of Constraints, identifying
and illustrating such violent cycles is the key to manage them by finding impactful solutions
(Baveja et al., 2020).
It is important to note that the complexity of supply chains will amplify the crisis further.
Different structures of supply chains are illustrated in Figure 1. Among the three types of supply
chains, the intertwined network type is more complex and is expected to be influenced by Covid-
19, more extensively.

Linear supply chain Supply network Intertwined supply network

Figure 1. Different types of supply chains (Ivanov and Dolgui, 2020)

Ivanov (2020) conducted a simulation study on the influence of Covid-19 (SARS-CoV-2) on the
global supply chains. He found that the timing of the closing and opening of the facilities at
different levels might be a significant factor in determining the epidemic outbreak effect on the
supply chain performance rather than an upstream disruption duration or the speed of epidemic
spread. Other important factors were lead-time, speed of epidemic propagation, and the upstream

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and downstream disruption durations in the supply chain. According to his assumptions, the
epidemic outbreaks can have three major features:
- long-term disruption and its unpredictable size;
- simultaneous disruption spread (i.e., the ripple effect) and epidemic outbreak spread (i.e.,
pandemic effect); and
- simultaneous disturbances in supply, logistics infrastructure and demand.
The above three mentioned features differentiate the supply chain risks under Covid-19 from
other supply chain risks. Govindan et al. (2020) also found that the disasters resulted from Covid-
19 is different from other disasters. Such difference has two particular features; their long-term
disruption and their increasing spread. Weak control of such disasters will lead to severe supply
chain disruptions.
Sharma et al. (2020) investigated the influence of Covid-19 on a number of industries and
highlighted the most important challenges as demand-supply mismatch, technology, development
of a resilient supply chain. They also explained that moving beyond profitability; companies are
experiencing difficulties to develop and maintain a sustainable supply chain.

4. Supply chain vulnerability cycle and risk management strategies

The supply chain vulnerability cycle can be explained by categorizing the process of a disruption
in different phases, as illustrated in Figure 2. Based on the occurrence of disruptions,
organizations can take measures before and after an unpredictable event to be resilient. Therefore,
actions that aim to avoid disruptions or to be prepared for them are referred to as “resistance
capacity”, while “recovery capacity” is the potential to restore operations after a disruption
occurs. The difference between the two elements of “resistance” is that one deals with preventing
disruptions completely (avoidance) and the other to decreasing the time between the start of a
disruption and the beginning of the recovery process (containment). The recovery process
includes a “stabilization” phase and the “return” to a stabilized performance. The length of
stabilization depends on the severity of the disruption. One more phase of supply chain resilience
can be defined in addition to resistance and recovery, i.e. the response phase in which, the ability
of supply chain is enhanced to learn and adapt in response to disturbances.
As Hynes et al. (2020) explained, “extensive consideration must be given not only to how risk is
absorbed and mitigated, but how affected systems will recover, adapt, and preferably ‘bounce
forward’ toward a more ideal system state”. As illustrated, the cycle has different zones. The
zone of stability indicates the pre-disruption and post-disruption periods of a supply chain. The
zone of robustness covers the recovery and post-stability periods of a supply chain. The zone of
resilience covers the zone of robustness, delayed impact and prepare for recovery periods.
Ultimately, the zone of viability covers all zones, since it deals with the long term impact of the
Corona-virus. It can be summarized that viability includes all four phases of prepare, absorb,
recover and adapt; resilience includes three phases of absorb, recover and adapt; robustness

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includes two phases of recover and adapt; and stability includes two phases of pre-disruption and
post-disruption. The concepts of stability, robustness, resilience and viability are further studied
in the following sections.

Figure 2. Supply chain vulnerability cycle (adapted from Güller and Henke, 2019 and Hynes et
al., 2020)

5. Supply chain stability

Ivanov et al. (2013) explained that while supply chain economic performance is important,
supply chain stability is manifesting itself as a significant subject, economically. Liu and Cao
(2012) explained that the impact factors of the supply chain stability can be categorized into three
aspects of the input and level of resources that the key supplier companies have; earnings
structure and benefit-sharing; and supply chain structure and relations among key supplier
companies. The Indicators of SC stability are addressed in Figure 3.
Ivanov and Sokolov (2010) analyzed some practical examples and determined the main factors of
stability loss at the strategic level as specialization and orientation to one market (or one client);
plans for unlimited profit growth; high credit obligations; lack of alternative suppliers; high
dependency on stock exchange; and geographical concentration of SC facilities in only one
region.
At the tactical and operational levels, they addressed weak coordination of plans and information
about demand and supply; stockless processes; weak control of cargo security; technological

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breaks (machines, transport, information systems); and human errors and false information
management.
Ivanov and Sokolov (2010) also explained that to compensate for the disturbances, a large variety
of control influences can be applied, which are SC security management; capital reserves;
strategic material inventories; market diversification and outsourcing; product lines’ flexibility
and modularity; safety stocks and time buffers; reserves of SC capacities; and SC coordination,
monitoring, and event management.

Figure 3. Indicators of the supply chain stability (Liu and Cao, 2012)

By comparing the studies of Liu ad Cao (2012) and Ivanov and Sokolov (2010), it can be
concluded that the stability loss factors at strategic and tactical, and operational levels are threats

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to the indicators of supply chain stability and the control factors can prevent the impact of threats
and delay the impacts as addressed in the short period of first response and prepare for recovery
in Figure 2.

6. Supply chain robustness

Generally, robustness deals with the degree of system sensitivity when disruptions happen.
Robustness ensures that a system will take a capability to ‘yield’ to a disruption. In other words,
the disruption will ‘consume’, or absorb existing robustness capacity. Robust systems have the
ability to absorb disruptions up to an exact point, beyond which the system suffers from
performance decrease (Mackay et al., 2019).
As Monostori (2018) explained, robustness is the ability of a supply chain to cope with external
and internal disruptions and disturbances. In a categorization, supply chain risks can be classified
into three categories of exposed demand-side, supply-side and catastrophic risks. Demand-side
risks are derived from disruptions due to downstream supply chain operations. Some of the
negative outcomes of demand side risks are costly shortages, obsolescence and inefficient
capacity utilization. Supply-side risks can be noticed as suppliers’ business risks, capacity
problems, technological changes, product design changes, inappropriate quality of the supply,
and poor logistics performance (late delivery). Catastrophic risks can be in forms of natural
hazards (e.g. tsunamis, earthquakes, hurricanes, droughts and floods), social-political instabilities,
civil unrests, economic crises and terrorist attacks.
Vlajic et al. (2016) classified supply chain disturbances as deviation, disruption or complete
failure of process in terms of value loss of relevant KPIs (Table 1). Minor deviations from the
nominal KPI results in small disturbances, which can be ignorable is business as usual. High KPI
deviations lead to disruptions in the outcomes of processes. Extreme values of process KPIs
indicate a process failure, which results in no process outcome, due to the interruption of a
manufacturing plant.

Table 1. Examples of disturbances in a delivery process (Vlajic et al., 2016)

Quantity dimension Quality dimension Time dimension
Magnitude/KPI Loss of material during Number of products damaged Transport time
transport in transport
Deviation Few product lost Few product damaged Slight delay
Disruption Shipment partially Significant part of the Significant delay
received shipment damaged
Failure Complete loss All products damaged Inability to perform delivery
in the required time window

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While Vlajic et al. (2016) represented disruption as a type of disturbance; Ivanov (2018) argued
that there are interactions among the elements and suggested an influence mechanism of
uncertainty → risk → disturbance → disruption. According to such a mechanism, supply chain
uncertainty exists in any system with a sensible extent of complexity, which can be reduced or
amplified. Supply chain risk is initiated from uncertainty and can be identified, analyzed,
controlled and regulated. Supply chain disturbance results from risk and can be prevented and
eliminated by means of redundancy and flexibility reserves. However, disturbance can cause a
deviation and high deviation can lead to disruption. Supply chain disruption results from a
disturbance and can disrupt the supply chain. Disruption can be eliminated by means of
adaptation (the last phase in Figure 1).
Accoring to Monostori (2018), a supply chain is robust when it is able to act in accordance with
the most important key performance indicators (KPI), at an acceptable level (i.e. remaining in a
predefined robustness zone) during and after unexpected event(s) / disruption(s). From this point
of view, robustness results in resilience, as the degree of absorptive capacity impacts the
threshold whereby general variability will result in a disruption.
Durach et al. (2015) proposed a wider picture of supply chain robustness. Their framework
included five parts and demonstrated robustness on both inter- and intra-organizational levels
with two dimensions of resistance and avoidance and antecedents and the moderator (Figure 4).

Figure 4. A conceptual framework of supply chain robustness (Durach et al., 2015)

7. Supply chain resilience

Considering the evolving research area of supply chain resilience, the routine resilience
measurement and improvement of supply chains can help organizations achieving significant
improvements. Zsidisin and Wqagner (2010) explained that supply chain resilience moderates the
influence of supply side resilient sources on disruption occurrence. To enhance the understanding
of supply chain resilience measurement, Shahi et al. (2019) proposed a list of indicators as
addressed in Table 2 based on a literature review, and by order of importance.

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Donadoni et al. (2019) also addressed a list of resilience metrics. They included recovery time,
recovery cost, market share (before and after disruption), contingency strategies cost, supply
chain resilience assessment and management (SCRAM), customer service, suppliers’ dependency
(first tier, second tier), time to survive, supply chain risk management maturity model, value at
risk, and supply chain operations reference model (SCOR).

Table 2. KPIs for measuring supply chain resilience (Shahi et al., 2019)
1. Minimum recovery time
2. Safety stock
3. Customer service level
4. Minimum total costs
5. Information sharing
6. Supply chain visibility
7. Inventory gap
8. Maximum on-time deliveries
9. Supply flexibility
10. Multiple channels sourcing rate
11. Production flexibility
12. Financial strength/cash flow
13. Lead time ratio
14. Transportation flexibility
15. Redundancy rate
16. Risk-sharing rate
17. Labor productivity
18. Cost of pre-positioning
emergency inventory
19. Stock-out time
20. Demand served during the
disruption
21. Recovery time an speed
22. Demand postponement rate
23. Percentage of unfulfilled demand
24. Sale lost ratio
25. Loss per unit of time
26. Cost of implementation of
recovery activities
27. Per unit cost for preparation that
exceeds demand (holding cost)
28. Per unit cost for preparation that
falls short of demand (shortage cost)
29. Distributed production rate
30. Minimum stock-out with least
stock levels
31. Customer loyalty/retention
32. Customer
satisfaction/dissatisfaction
33. Net earning

Resilience has two key aspects of anticipation and visibility. Both can be improved by sharing
knowledge on appropriate changes earlier or when the change happens. Robustness is a means
towards resilience and anticipation is the first step in robustness to gain knowledge about
potential changes that might happen in the future. Agility is the other means of resilience and
visibility is the first step to be agile. Visibility is necessary in achieving knowledge about actual
changes that are currently happening. Two more key aspects to achieve resilience are
preparedness and speed, which can be improved by enhancing relation-specific assets that help
supply chains to face change in a proactive or reactive way. While robustness requires
preparedness to stabilize supply chain, agility requires speed to move supply chain back to a
stable situation. The above mentioned mechanisms are briefly illustrated in Figure 5.

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Figure 5. Mechanisms of supply chain resilience (Wieland and Wallenburg, 2013)

Donadoni et al. (2019) performed a study and suggested a list of resilience strategies based on the
viewpoints of a group of academic experts (Table 3).

Table 3. Resilience strategies identified by the academic experts (Donadoni et al., 2019)
Redundancy Insurance Hedging for commodity price risk
Business continuity planning Building security Resilience software
Flexibility Contracts Quality practices
Collaboration Safety rules Financial solutions
Supply chain design Training competitors Risk management practices
Visibility  Emergency centre Supplier evaluation

It is important to note that the supply chain resilence strategies and metrics vary in different
studies based on the case study conditions (Ribeiro and Barbosa-Povoa, 2018).

7.1 Resilience score

Pettit et al. (2010) believed that the scope of supply chain resilience is broader than the above
mentioned strategies; the framework should encompass all supply chain processes, relationships,
and resources that provide capabilities to eliminate vulnerabilities. As illustrated in Figure 6,
when capabilities increase and vulnerabilities decrease, supply chain resilience increases.

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0% %
10 75 %
R= 50
R= R=

In
%

cre
25

as
R=

ing
res
ili
en
ce R=
0%

Figure 6. Supply chain resilience competition (Pettit et al., 2010; Pettit et al., 2013;
Radhakrishnan et al., 2018)

Pettit et al. (2010) also addressed the vulnerability factors and capability factors as addressed in
Tables 4 and 5.
Table 4. Vulnerability factors (Pettit et al., 2010; Pettit et al., 2013)
Vulnerability factor Definition Sub-factors
Turbulence Environment characterized by frequent Natural disasters, Geopolitical disruptions,
changes in external factors beyond Unpredictability of demand, Fluctuations in currencies and
your control prices, Technology failures, Pandemic
Deliberate threats Intentional attacks aimed at disrupting Theft, Terrorism/sabotage, Labor disputes, Espionage,
operations or causing human or financial harm Special interest groups, Product liability

External pressures Influences, not specifically targeting the firm, Competitive innovation, Social/Cultural change,
that create business constraints or barriers Political/Regulatory change, Price pressures,
Corporate responsibility, Environmental change
Resource limits Constraints on output based on availability of Supplier, Production and Distribution capacity, Raw
the factors of production material and Utilities availability, Human resources
Sensitivity Importance of carefully controlled conditions Complexity, Product purity, Restricted materials, Fragility,
for product and process integrity Reliability of equipment, Safety hazards, Visibility to
stakeholders, Symbolic profile of brand, Concentration of
capacity
Connectivity Degree of interdependence and reliance on Scale of network, Reliance upon information, Degree of
outside entities outsourcing, Import and Export channels, Reliance upon
specialty sources
Supplier/customer Susceptibility of suppliers and customers to Supplier reliability, Customer disruptions
disruptions external forces or disruptions

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Table 5. Capability factors (Pettit et al., 2010; Pettit et al., 2013)
Capability factor Definition Sub-factors
Flexibility in Ability to quickly change inputs or the mode of Part commonality, Modular product design, Multiple uses,
sourcing receiving inputs Supplier contract flexibility, Multiple sources
Flexibility in order Ability to quickly change outputs or the mode Alternate distribution channels, Risk pooling/sharing,
fulfillment of delivering outputs Multi-sourcing, Delayed commitment/Production
postponement, Inventory management, Rerouting of
requirements
Capacity Availability of assets to enable sustained Reserve capacity, Redundancy, Backup energy sources
production levels and communications
Efficiency Capability to produce outputs with minimum Waste elimination, Labor productivity, Asset utilization,
resource requirements Product variability reduction, Failure prevention
Visibility Knowledge of the status of operating assets and Business intelligence gathering, Information technology,
the environment Product, equipment and people visibility, Information
exchange
Adaptability Ability to modify operations in response to Fast rerouting of requirements, Lead time reduction,
challenges or opportunities Strategic gaming and simulation, Seizing advantage from
disruptions, Alternative technology development, Learning
from experience
Anticipation Ability to discern potential future events or Monitoring early warning signals, Forecasting, Deviation
situations and near-miss analysis, Risk management, Business
continuity/preparedness planning, Recognition of
opportunities
Recovery Ability to return to normal operational state Crisis management, Resource mobilization,
rapidly Communications strategy, Consequence mitigation
Dispersion Broad distribution or decentralization of assets Distributed decision making, Distributed capacity and
assets, Decentralization of key resources, Location-
specific empowerment, Dispersion of markets
Collaboration Ability to work effectively with other entities Collaborative forecasting, Customer management,
for mutual benefit Communications, Postponement of orders, Product life
cycle management, Risk sharing with partners
Organization Human resource structures, policies, skills, and Accountability, Creative problem solving, Cross-training,
culture Substitute leadership/empowerment, Learning/
benchmarking, Culture of caring
Market position Status of a company or its products in specific Product differentiation, Customer loyalty/retention, Market
markets share, Brand equity, Customer relationships, Customer
communications
Security Defense against deliberate intrusion or attack Layered defenses, Access restrictions, Employee
involvement, Collaboration with governments, Cyber-
security, Personnel security
Financial strength Capacity to absorb fluctuations in cash flow Insurance, Portfolio diversification, Financial reserves and
liquidity, Price margin

Pettit et al. (2013) investigated the linkages between vulnerability factors and capability factors
as addressed in Table 6.

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Table 6. The linkages between vulnerability factors and capability factors (Pettit et al., 2013)
Vulnerability factor Linked capability factor Vulnerability factor Linked capability factor
Turbulence Flexibility in Sourcing Sensitivity Efficiency
Flexibility in Order Fulfillment Adaptability
Capacity Dispersion
Visibility Security
Adaptability Connectivity Flexibility in sourcing
Anticipation Flexibility in order fulfillment
Recovery Efficiency
Dispersion Visibility
Collaboration Adaptability
Security Anticipation
Deliberate threats Adaptability Collaboration
Anticipation Organization
Recovery Market position
Dispersion Security
Security Financial strength
External pressures Flexibility in sourcing Supplier/customer Flexibility in sourcing
Flexibility in order fulfillment disruptions Flexibility in order fulfillment
Visibility Capacity
Adaptability Visibility
Anticipation Recovery
Market position  Dispersion
Resource limits Flexibility in sourcing Collaboration
Flexibility in order fulfillment Market position
Capacity Financial strength
Efficiency
Adaptability
Anticipation
Dispersion
Market position
Financial strength

Pettit et al. (2013) suggested the following equation for computing the resilience score (R):

C-V+4
R= (1)
8

Where ‘C’ represents the average value of capability factors and ‘V’ represents the average value
of vulnerability factors. The resilience score, ‘R’, ranges from 0% to 100% as depicted in Figure
6.

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8. Supply chain viability: re-consideration of supply chain resilience

Maintaining and improving supply chain resilience are the two important policies during Covid-
19 (Hobbs, 2020). To re-consider the concept of supply chain resilience, it is important to
highlight the difference of resilience and viability. Such a difference is explained in Table 7.

Table 7. Resilience vs. viability (Ivanov and Dolgui, 2020)

Criterion Resilience Viability
System Close Open
Structure Static Dynamic
Scope of analysis Disruption-driven (single, discrete, unique events) Behavior-driven (continuous change)
Subject of analysis Discrete, singular disruption-reaction analysis within Continuous evolution through disruption-reaction
a closed system setting balancing in the open system context
Target of analysis Performance oriented Survival-oriented
Period of analysis Fixed time window No fixed time window
Object of analysis Linear supply chain system Intertwined supply networks/ supply chain
ecosystems

Golan et al. (2020) studied supply chain resilience literature with focus on resilience modeling
and quantification and connected the supply chain to other networks, including transportation and
command and control. Based on their review, the following four recommendations emerged to
move the field of supply chain resilience analytics modeling forward:
1. (Re)consideration of the definition of supply chain resilience is necessary to enhance the
efficiency of resilience management. They recommended adoption of the standard four-stage
definition of resilience provided by NAS, i.e. plan, absorb, recover, adapt;
2. Consideration of different types of disruptions in the supply chain resilience models –
particularly system recovery assessment from unknown disruptions and systemic threats – is
necessary to emphasize that supply chain resilience management can be quantified;
3. Consideration of the tiered approach to modeling, with a range of simple metrics to advanced
network models, is needed to understand which quantification method should be used;
4. Consideration of the supply chain within the extended context of other networks that generate
value (e.g., command and control, cyber, transportation) is needed for quantifying global network
interactions and more robust supply chain resilience models that accurately describe trade-offs
between efficiency and resilience to prevent cascading failures.
During Covid-19, businesses should focus on how to minimize supply chain disruptions and to
adjust immediately to a changing landscape by first determining their risk structure in supply and
its impact on demand. Then, they need to predict supply shortages caused by unforeseen supply

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chain disruptions (e.g., lockdowns and closing of air or railways) to think about other modes of
transportation. They will also need to pre-book their freight arrangements to prevent traffic until
the restrictions are lifted. Finally, they may consider multiple sourcing alternatives. However in
Table 8, three steps are suggested for the improvement of supply chain during Covid-19.

Table 8. Three steps for improving SCM during the Corona-virus outbreak (Adapted from
McKinsey, 2020 by Liu et al., 2020)
Understand exposure Anticipate shortages Source for alternative options
Identify origin of supply to identify Determine available inventory and Consider alternatives; i.e., move to non-Chinese
severity of risk consider transport alternatives countries if multi-sourced
Enhance communication to Pre-book air freight/rail capacity and Automation/deploy AI; or develop new supplies
employees on infection risk concerns try to avoid congested routes
Determine impacted demand to
determine required supply

Similar to Liu et al. (2020), Settanni (2020) suggested a three steps approach for managing the
influence of Covid-19 on supply chains, based on the vulnerability lessons learnt. They included
i) choosing sourcing locations; ii) establishing supply dependencies through outsourcing and off-
shoring decisions; and iii) matching supply to a changing, often erratic demand. This was
compatible with the three steps procedure suggested by van Hoek (2020) for managing risks in
supply, demand and control aspects.

8.1 Viable supply chain

The subjects in supply chain risk management have been evolving over the time and this
evolution is expected to continue with respect to the dynamic nature of threats to supply chains
worldwide. However, the transformations and their associated types of supply chain risk
management strategies are framed in a historical perspective in Figure 7. Supply chains have
been influenced by both internal and external factors. Not only the concepts of lean, responsive,
and globalized in structural designs are important in effective supply chain management, but also
learning how to act in line with nature and societal interests (i.e., become sustainable); how to
empower their resilience during disruptions; how to recover and manage the ripple effects; and
how to benefit from the advantages of digital technologies are also critical in the survival of the
supply chains of today. It seems in 2020, the leagility, resilience, and sustainability subjects of
SCs are relatively more important. The evolution of supply chain risk management strategies
have been made in a response to the changing triggers over the time and currently, supply chains
worldwide have experienced an unprecedented series of shocks caused by the COVID-19 virus
outbreak and global pandemic, which have resulted in a new troublemaker of disruptions quite
unlike any seen in the past (Ivanov, 2020b).

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Triggers:
Lean; Natural and Man- Climate change; Industry 4.0; Data Global
Responsiveness made disasters Society and Economics analysis pandemic

Viability

Digitalization

Sustainability

Resilience

Leagility

1990 2005 2010 2015 2020

Figure 7. Evolution of supply chain risk management strategies over time (Ivanov, 2020b)

According to Ivanov (2020b), viability is the highest analysis level for the reactions of supply
chain to disturbances and includes stability, robustness and resilience (Table 9).

Table 9. Major analysis the concepts for supply chain performance under uncertainty (Ivanov
and Dolgui, 2020)
Operational Disruption in supply Output
Concept Recovery Survivability
disturbance chain structures performance
Stability 
Robustness   
Resilience   
Viability    

Stability is about the ability of a supply chain to return to a pre-disturbance state and ensures
continuity; Robustness means the ability to bear up a disruption (or a series of disruptions) to
meet the planned performance; Resilience is the ability to withstand a disruption (or a series of
disruptions) and recover the performance; and Viability means the ability to maintain itself and
survive in a changing environment over a long period of time through a redesign of the structures
and re-planning of economic performance with long-term impacts.
Viable supply chain is a dynamically adaptable and structurally changeable value-adding
network. This network is able to i) react to positive changes in an agile manner; ii) be resilient to

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absorb negative incidents and recover after the disruptions; and iii) survive in the long-term
global disruptions by adjusting the utilization of capacities and their allocations to demands
considering internal and external changes as well as the sustainable developments to ensure the
delivery of goods and services to the society and markets in a long-term perspective.
Based on a literature analysis, Ivanov (2020b) identified intersections of leagility, resilience,
sustainability, and digitalization and proposed a model for viable supply chain. This model is
illustrated in Figure 8.

Organizational structure:

Backup suppliers
Backup subcontractors
Facility fortification
Workforce resilience
Process-Functional Informational
Structure: Structure:
Inventory and capacity buffers Digital twins
Flexible capacities and Data analytics
sourcing Visibility
Omni-channel Viable Supplier prtals
Product diversification and Blockchain
substitution
Supply Chain

Technological
Financial
Structure:
Structure:
Additive manufacturing
Liquidity reserves
Robotics
Business-government
Smart manufacturing and
collaboration
warehousing
Revenue management
Industry 4.0

Figure 8. A multi-structural VSC view (Ivanov, 2020b)

The proposed mode of Ivanov (2020b) is compatible with the recommendations of Sharma et al.
(2020) who suggested eight priorities to conquer the challenges of supply chains during the
global pandemic. They included reimagining and redesigning supply chain; designing intelligent
workflows; relying on technology; a dynamic response; developing a culture of collaboration;
diversification and dynamic adoption; a forward-looking strategy; and focus on sustainable

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supply chain. It also supports the recommended ECAC principles of Jabbour et al. (2020). ECAC
included the four principles of Engineering, Collaboration, Agility and Culture for developing
resilience in supply chains.

9. Discussion and conclusions

The most important difference of the global pandemic compared to the other types of supply
chain threats is that the impact of Covid-19 remains for a long time and therefore the current used
approaches for risk analysis and mitigation might no longer be effective. As much as the problem
is more complex its solution might become more complicated. In complicated solutions the
systematic mechanism of improvement actions and the reliability of infrastructures become
critically important. An evidence for this argument is Craighead et al. (2020) who proposed an
agenda for supply chain management research on pandemics by considering how the key
principles of well-known and emergent theories can clarify challenges and potential solutions.
Particularly, they considered how resource dependence theory, institutional theory, resource
orchestration theory, structural inertia, game theory, real options theory, event systems theory,
awareness-motivation-capability framework, prospect theory, and tournament theory can be
helpful in resolving the problems raised by pandemics in supply chains and how they can help
managers formulate responses.
Due to the freshness of the subject the number referenced with a direct relationship with the
subject were limited to 24. However, among the supply chain risk management strategies the
most recent one, i.e. the evolving strategy of supply chain viability suggested by Ivanov (2020b)
seems more capable to resolve the problem.
Since the influence of Covid-19 on supply chains is typically a domino effect, the severity of the
effect seems to be different in supply chains depending on their complexity. Particularly with
respect to the study of Ivanov and Dolgui (2020), it is expected that in a intertwined supply
network, the total effect is higher than in the other two types of supply chains. Therefore, as Fan
and Stevenson (2018) highlighted the importance of the matrix of risk treatment strategies based
on probability and impact, the probability of vulnerability factors should be also analyzed in
addition to their effects on supply chains.
Literature review indicated that the risk factors can be varied in different case studies, i.e.
different supply chains. This depends on the nature and structure of supply chains. Organizational
size of the players in the chain is another important factor that should be considered in analysis.
While most of the available references on the subject of supply chain risk management have been
conducted in the manufacturing sector, analyzing risk in service supply chain is relatively more
complicated, since many service businesses have multi-level and bidirectional supply chains
(Shahin, 2010).

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Researchers like Liu and Cao (2012) suggested a relatively complete list of the indicators of
supply chain stability. While with regard to the cycle of supply chain vulnerability (Figure 2),
their suggested list can be used in two phases of pre and post disruptions to measure how the
resilience and robustness strategies have been effective, there are not enough resources available
on the stability strategies. However, since the zone of robustness has overlap with the zone of
stability, the strategies of robustness might be applied for the post disruption phase and still there
is a lack of knowledge on the strategies in the stability related to the pre-disruption phase.
The mechanism of uncertainty → risk → disturbance → disruption addressed by Ivanov (2018)
similar to the interconnection of magnitude/KPI, deviation, disruption and failure (Vlajic et al.,
2016) can influence the vulnerability cycle. This influence has not been investigated in the
literature, particularly in the prepare and absorb stages of the cycle wherein the form of
transformation of threats is important to be studied.
While literature review indicates relatively complete resources on supply chain resilience, i.e. the
KPIs, strategies, vulnerability factors, capability factors and resilience score, less resources are
available on the other subjects of stability, robustness and viability. Although supply chain
viability is relatively a new concept in supply chain risk management and its evolution and
knowledge maturity seem take time, its knowledge is expected to rapidly develop due to the
criticality of the increasingly harmful influence of the Corona-virus on supply chains worldwide.
However, it is important to note that the subject of supply chain viability is not independent from
other previous subjects. In other words, according to the vulnerability cycle and the zone of
viability, in order for a supply chain to be viable, it should also be stable, resilient and robust.

9.1 Agenda for future research

Based on the insights of this review, future research can be performed by the following
guidelines:
i) The global pandemic has a long term effect on supply chains, therefore identifying and
implementing risk monitoring approaches during the whole cycle of supply chain vulnerability is
necessary. This lack of knowledge was addressed earlier by Fan and Stevenson (2018) in a
literature review on supply chain risk management.
ii) The subject of correlation among supply chain risks and their influence on the supply chain
has not been studied in the literature. This subject is particularly important regarding the more
complex structures of supply chains such as intertwined supply networks and considering the
domino effect of Covid-19.
iii) Developing quadrant analysis such as risk probability-effect matrix and categorizing supply
chain viability strategies is a demanding subject of study. In such a study, even categorization of
the available sets of strategies such as resilience strategies is valuable.

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iv) A comprehensive investigation on supply chains considering the type of industries and
determining the most Coronavirus effected chains is increasingly important in every country. In
addition to determining the most effected chains, customizing the generic sets of KPIs, strategies,
etc. of supply chain risk management for the prioritized industries/supply chains is another
important subject of future study.
v) A typical supply chain can be a combination of both manufacturing and service companies. As
a subject of future study, the subject of supply chain risk management should be extended to the
service supply chain and the existing knowledge as reviewed in this paper should be further
developed to include both manufacturing and service players in a supply chain.
vi) The influence of the mechanism of uncertainty → risk → disturbance → disruption on the
cycle of supply chain vulnerability is another subject of future study. Particularly, studying the
transformation speed of the four mentioned elements and its influence on the shape of the cycle is
significantly important to manage the cycle related costs.
vii) The knowledge of supply chain viability as the last generation of supply chain risk
management strategies needs to be further developed. Particularly, developing its performance
measurement system is of high priority as a subject of future study.

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