Washington Post:  “Biden, saying global supply chains must be improved, pledged Sunday to provide additional funding and improved management of mineral stockpiles to ease problems with production and moving goods to market.  ‘Supply chain is something that most of our citizens never think twice about unless something goes wrong,’ he said in remarks at the G-20 summit. ‘And during this pandemic, we’ve seen delays and backlogs of goods.’

“Slowdowns in supply chains have led to massive delays of goods moving internationally and threaten to slow the economic recovery from the pandemic, both globally and in the United States. The problems have caused huge increases in shipping costs, fueling inflation — which, in turn, could become a political problem for Biden and the Democratic Party.

“Biden said he would sign an executive order Sunday giving the Pentagon the ability to more quickly release material from the National Defense Stockpile. He also announced an effort to cut the customs-related red tape that has delayed goods flowing through Southeast Asia. And he offered technical assistance to break bottlenecks that are slowing supply routes through Mexico and Central America. ‘Now that we have seen how vulnerable these lines of global commerce can be, we cannot go back to business as usual,’ Biden said.

“The announcements were part of a ‘Summit on Global Supply Chain Resilience’ that Biden convened with the European Union and other countries to focus on strengthening and diversifying global supply chains.  Governments can play a key role, Biden said, in anticipating and responding to shortages, ensuring supply chains are not relying on child labor and finding ways to reduce supply chains’ effect on climate change.”