Dr Flavio Macau, Director of Academic Studies at the School of Business and Law at Edith Cowan University Australia, shares his views on the matter.
Sputnik: Will supply chains be badly affected by the coronavirus?
Dr Flavio Macau: People are not right to stockpile supplies because supply chains are healthy, they are doing well. What’s happened is that too many people are trying to buy products at the same time, and then you have a stampede, and then you don’t have enough products at that moment to fulfil all needs.
People are still going to factories, people are still driving their trucks, and the products keep coming, so in not too much time everything should be back to normal because we don’t have an issue with the supply chain.
Sputnik: Can governments realistically safeguard businesses from being damaged by the coronavirus?
Dr Flavio Macau: Will it be enough? I’m not sure I would say that, but it will not enough to enable most businesses to get to the other side, to survive this very difficult, this very hard time that will be coming in the next few months.
Depending on which sector you are working in; for example with regards to coffee shops you will have some potentially tough times ahead, so measures from governments will help them make it through the next few months at least, and then things will slowly get back to normal, so it definitely is helpful.
Sputnik: How will the global economy recover once the threat of the coronavirus has diminished?
Dr Flavio Macau: All these countries will be affected at different times. China is already recovering and Europe will recover soon enough, we have different economies most definitely, but all of these countries have strong economic principles, and there is a lot of exaggeration at this moment.
Life will not be exactly as it was in the past. You remember 9/11, before that we didn’t have airport restrictions and things like that, and then when new implementations of procedures and rules came, we had to adapt, and nowadays they are normal because they have been around for almost twenty years.
Economies will recover, they should not take long to recover, and we will adapt to a new way of living and doing business that can adjust more quickly to such diseases and pandemics, and things like that.