Supply chain logistics is an extremely complex process. Doesn't matter if it's oil or baked beans. Literally nobody has a clue how their baked beans got on the supermarket shelf other than the fact that maybe they arrived on a truck. The simplest analogy is imagine you plan a normally two-hour drive on the motorway that may be two and a half hours on a really busy day. Then imagine a ten-car pile-up that blocks the motorway and you're delayed an additional 60 minutes. Now imagine not one 10-car pile-up, but fifteen x ten car pile-ups that encompass both north and south bound traffic for 80 kilometres, plus every offramp on your entire route. Those of us that can't call in their private helicopter to rescue them will be camping out beside the motorway for two days. International supply chains have become accustomed to JIT (just in time) deliveries to preserve cashflow, limit pressure on storage facilities, and have everything from trucks, to ships, to planes, to packaging, to full or empty containers being in the right place at the right time to keep them baked beans (or oil) on the shelf and replaced at the expected rate of depletion. Then imagine that you allow your precious stock of baked beans (say 100 days worth) to be depleted at the usual rate of consumption (plus panic buying) while knowing full well that although you've sourced alternative supplies, the volume is 50% down from normal, the ships haven't left the foreign port yet, and in a competitive market somebody with a bigger cheque book might convince the shipper to redirect your en route beans to an alternate buyer. So even if your beans arrive in 40 days, your stock is now down to 50 days. Rinse and repeat. Never mind the issues of non-production in the Gulf states, restarting production (yeah, just push a button), lack of storage facilities to handle increased demand, tankers in all the wrong places. It's gonna be a right royal Foxtrot-Uniform. The proverbial excrement hasn't hit the fan yet. It's travelling - well actually NOT travelling at about zero knots per hour. A slow boat to China would be preferential. Even if all the ships started moving tomorrow, the oil supply chain will still be in a crisis state for a year or more.
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