Offshoring was followed by reshoring – and now US officials’ latest wheeze to deal with massive global supply chain disruption is “friendshoring”. The turbulent events of recent years – including Donald Trump’s trade wars, the Covid-19 crisis and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine – have called into question the vision of a globalised economy.
Many of the western companies that embraced offshoring – cutting costs by shifting manufacturing to countries with cheaper labour – have been encouraged by tariffs and pandemic supply chain disruption to bring production back to their home country, in a trend known as onshoring or reshoring.
