Author Archive

Supply Chain

September 1, 2021

The issuance of U.S. Executive Order 14017 in February 2021 signaled a pivotal moment in national industrial policy, mandating a comprehensive review of the semiconductor supply chain to identify and mitigate vulnerabilities. In the months following the Executive Order, both foundries and original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) have been under increasing pressure to map their supplier […]

Supply Chain

August 15, 2021

The EU Taxonomy Regulation, effective as of June 2020, introduced a transformative shift in how large corporations must categorize their economic activities with respect to sustainability. By 2021, as companies began grappling with the operational realities of compliance, supply-chain managers found themselves facing an increasingly complex landscape. The Regulation’s scope, though framed around environmental objectives […]

Supply Chain

August 1, 2021

Australia’s National Waste Policy Action Plan, published in December 2019, marked a significant turning point in the country’s approach to waste reduction and resource recovery. As part of its strategic objectives, the Plan established a clear mandate for consumer-goods companies to engage with circular economy principles, with a strong focus on reducing packaging waste, increasing […]

ISIC

July 15, 2021

Coming out of the first pandemic winter, it seemed every conversation in business circles circled back to digital: who had moved fastest, which firms were scaling, and how new habits—streaming, shopping, remote everything—might stick. Yet, behind the optimism (and occasional hype), there was a real challenge for anyone tasked with measuring what was actually happening […]

ISIC

July 11, 2021

If you want to understand a region—truly understand its economic DNA—there’s no shortcut. You have to dig into the data, yes, but also pay attention to how that data is organized. Too often, we fixate on the numbers and forget that the framework shaping them is just as critical. This is where the International Standard […]

Supply Chain

July 1, 2021

The enforcement of the EU Directive on single-use plastics from July 3, 2021 marked a turning point in the regulation of packaging materials and their environmental footprint across the bloc. For retailers, the Directive introduced both compliance challenges and opportunities to enhance packaging supply-chain transparency through systematic tracking and disclosure. Retailers were called upon to […]

Supply Chain

July 1, 2021

The passage of the 2020 U.S. Farm Bill in December 2020 introduced significant measures to enhance supply chain traceability for critical agricultural commodities, particularly dairy and soybean products. Among the reforms was a strengthened mandate for transparency in crop insurance data, which aimed to provide greater visibility into indemnity payments, yield trends, and farm-level production […]

Supply Chain

June 15, 2021

The release of India’s Draft National Logistics Policy in December 2020 signaled a significant shift in the country’s approach to modernizing its supply chains, with a strong emphasis on digital integration and transparency. A core feature of the policy was the advancement of open freight data initiatives, aimed at streamlining containerized cargo movements and enhancing […]

ISIC

May 30, 2021

Few stories in recent memory have so thoroughly entwined science, logistics, and politics as the global rollout of vaccines from 2019 through 2021. For analysts trying to follow the thread—not just who made the vaccines, but how they moved from factories to arms—the challenge was turning an avalanche of headlines and press releases into a […]

ISIC

May 15, 2021

Supply chains, for all their apparent efficiency, have always harbored hidden fragilities. It took a series of global shocks—most notably the COVID-19 pandemic, but also tsunamis, hurricanes, and sudden trade disruptions—to lay bare the sheer complexity and vulnerability embedded in the networks that keep economies running. For policymakers and business leaders, the urgent question became: […]

Supply Chain

May 1, 2021

The U.K. Future Generations Bill, introduced in draft form in November 2020, aims to weave long-term sustainability into the fabric of public policy. Although the bill was still making its way through Parliament during 2021, its draft guidance was already shaping how public procurement frameworks were evolving and how businesses, especially SMEs, were positioning themselves […]

Supply Chain

April 15, 2021

The 2021 National Defense Authorization Act marked another step in the ongoing attempt to untangle U.S. defense supply chains from strategic dependencies that could compromise national security. Nowhere is this more visible than in the field of rare earth elements (REEs). These critical minerals underpin everything from missile guidance systems to communications gear. And yet, […]

ISIC

April 7, 2021

The shift from linear to circular economic models is gathering momentum around the world. Policymakers, businesses, and researchers increasingly recognize that sustainable growth requires more than just efficient resource use—it demands the creation of closed loops, where materials and products are reused, remanufactured, and recycled rather than discarded. But how does one measure progress toward […]

ISIC

April 5, 2021

Financial services have always seemed a bit like plumbing: crucial when everything is flowing, but largely invisible until something goes wrong. The past few years—2018 through 2020—were a test for the world’s pipes. Market shocks, policy swings, and, ultimately, a global pandemic put the sector’s resilience under a spotlight. For those tasked with measuring this […]