Global supply chains (GSCs) — through which intermediate goods and services from disparate locations go into making a finished product — have already changed the world. They account for nearly 80 per cent of global trade, including about $12tn in the trade of intermediate goods and services.
Over the next decade, the shifting nature of GSCs is set to remould the global trade matrix, according to a study by Standard Chartered.
The bank finds that China — fountainhead of the world’s biggest GSC — is set to shed much of its low-cost manufacturing. India and Asean, a grouping of 10 southeast Asian nations, are likely to benefit from the relocation of this low cost work, with Bangladesh and Africa also playing a role. Lastly, China’s strategy to build infrastructure along its New Silk Road, or “One Belt, One Road” project, foreshadows the GSC’s expansion into relatively new territories.