India has been struggling for weeks to control the second wave of Covid-19 that is creating panic across the country.
This is a worrying sign for India, because last year, it fell into recession for the first time in nearly a quarter of a century, partly due to the harsh nationwide blockade imposed by the government.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi has so far resisted calls to impose a second nationwide lockdown, even as many states have enacted their own strict restrictions.
If the crisis worsens, everything from clothing and pharmaceuticals to financial services and global shipping will feel the shock of India’s Covid-19 crisis.
Covid-19 vaccine vials in the laboratory at the Serum Institute of India in January.
According to the United Nations World Conference on Trade and Development, about 80% of global goods are transported by ship and India provides a large number of workers for this industry.
More than 200,000 of the approximately 1.7 million seafarers on global cargo ships come from India, according to Guy Platten, Secretary General of the International Office of Shipping.
`We hope the current situation will be resolved,` Platten said in an interview with CNN.
Because a series of countries have banned flights from India, moving Indian seafarers to ports around the world and changing crew is impossible.
René Piil Pedersen, head of Maritime Relations at Maersk, the world’s largest shipping company, hopes countries will have a mechanism to differentiate between regular travelers and seafarers.
`The mental health of seafarers will be severely affected,` Pedersen said.
Covid-19 last year threw the global shipping industry into chaos, with nearly 200,000 seafarers stranded for months due to port closures and flight bans.
In addition, the movement of cargo ships is also significantly limited.
Experts say that vaccinating seafarers could be a solution, but it is relatively difficult to implement.
The global vaccination drive is being significantly affected by the Covid-19 wave in India, the country that produces more than 60% of vaccines sold globally.
SII last year agreed to produce up to 200 million doses of Covid-19 vaccine for 92 countries.
The bad news doesn’t stop there.
India is the world’s largest supplier of generic drugs.
But Indian drugmakers import 70% of their raw materials from China, a link in the global supply chain vulnerable to Covid-19.
In a letter to the Indian embassy in Beijing, Ravi Udaya Bhaskar, director general of the Indian Pharmaceutical Export Promotion Council, called the suspension of Sichuan Airlines’ cargo operations `worrying`,
`Most countries depend on India for generic drug supplies and India depends on China for raw materials. This will be a strong blow to the global pharmaceutical supply chain if trade between the two
The current impact on this field is not really clear.
Workers work at a knitting factory in Kolkata, India, in January.
India is one of the world’s largest textile exporters and the industry is also struggling with severe labor shortages.
`This is the first time our generation has had to go through such a situation. No one was prepared for this scary scenario,` said Arpit Aryan Gupta, partner and business development director at apparel manufacturer NG
NG Apparels, which produces products for many famous brands such as New Balance or Nordstrom, employs about 100 skilled and semi-skilled workers in India, but nearly half of them have quit since the Covid-19 wave.
According to Gupta, he had to provide free housing to the remaining workers to keep the factory running.
In other places, the production situation is not better.
Wazir Advisors said that India’s garment consumption and exports last year decreased by 30% and 24%, respectively.
India is also an important center for the back offices of major banks and accounting firms.
Many companies in the past few decades have outsourced information technology (IT) services and operations to India due to qualified workers and cheap labor costs.
Some companies are having to find ways to handle the crisis with various measures, such as moving offices to other countries, encouraging employees to work remotely or extending project deadlines.
Goldman Sachs and Wells Fargo have applied remote working regulations to all workers.
British banks such as Barclays, NatWest and Standard Chartered are shifting work to other countries to ease the pressure on employees in India, as many of them contract Covid-19 or have to care for relatives infected with the virus at home.
When the Covid-19 wave first broke out, EY India, with more than 56,000 employees, activated its continuity of work plan, shifting work to other geographies and almost all of its employees are now