A rapidly spreading COVID-19 outbreak has left factories operating below capacity in Vietnam’s industrial northern provinces, where suppliers for Apple and other multinational tech firms are located, Reuters reports, citing “industry sources.”
Phuong Nguyen and James Pearson for Reuters:
After successfully containing the new coronavirus for most of last year, Vietnam is now battling an outbreak that is spreading more quickly. More than 3,000 people have been infected in 30 of its 63 cities and provinces since late April. The capital Hanoi, and the southern business hub of Ho Chi Minh City, have shut restaurants and banned public gatherings.
Four business sources said their operations had been affected as some areas have entered lockdown, raising concerns about supply chain disruption.
A source at one Apple supplier said the company had split its workforce over two shifts, describing it as a “temporary solution, for maybe two weeks… Otherwise, the supply chain will be more or less disrupted,” said the source, who requested anonymity because they were not authorised to speak to the media.
On Wednesday, the government said it would gradually reopen four industrial parks that were closed a week earlier because of the latest outbreak. The resumption of production at the industrial parks is part of state efforts to “ensure worker income, attract more investment in industrial parks, and contribute to socio-economic development.”
Hong Sun, Vice Chairman of the Korean Chamber of Business in Vietnam (KORCHAM)… told Reuters, “First-tier suppliers are not yet heavily impacted, but certain factories are slowing-down and suffering from the fourth wave of COVID-19 in Vietnam.”
MacDailyNews Take: According to Vietnamese government data, at least 1.04 million people in the country have had one dose of COVID-19 vaccine, but just 28,529 have been fully vaccinated.