In March 2021, the container ship Ever Given ran aground in the Suez Canal. The six days that the canal remained closed raised a wave of concern around the world as passage through this strategic waterway, which carries 30% of the world's container traffic, was blocked. The incident caused serious delays in global supply chains, the effects of which were still being felt months after the crisis.

Concern over the Ever Given case now pales in comparison to that caused by attacks by the Houthis, a Yemeni insurgent group , in the vicinity of the Bab el-Mandeb Strait at entrance the Red Sea on their way to European markets via the Suez Canal. In early November 2023 this rebel group began bombing Israeli and U.S. targets in support of the Palestinian group Hamas. Its attacks, which have extended to commercial traffic venturing through the area, seek to provoke a collapse that would force Israel to halt its offensive in Gaza.

There are also cost overruns for shipping lines which, in order to avoid the area, have decided to divert traffic to the route around the Cape of Good Hope. At 9,000 kilometers and 14 days longer, this route is currently safer than the Suez Canal route.

In addition, it is to be expected that sustained tension on this route will eventually increase the price of energy. Approximately 12 % of the crude oil traded in the world passes through Suez, before passing through the Bab el-Mandeb strait.

In addition, there will be cost overruns due to delays caused by the circumnavigation of Africa and the possibility of mismatches between supply and demand for inputs.

All these factors create a scenario that, if sustained, is likely to result in higher consumer prices and a rebound in inflation.

This status directly affects Europe, but also countries such as China and India, not to mention the very negative effect on the Economics of Egypt, which controls the Suez Canal.

This is not the only maritime passage in difficulty. In Panama, the reduced draft of the canal, as a result of a long drought, prevents the transit of heavier ships, which must seek alternatives that are almost always more costly.

In addition, it cannot be ruled out that the Strait of Hormuz (Persian Gulf) or the Strait of Malacca (Southeast Asia), core topic points of international maritime transport, may also become sources of instability due to their status in areas of great geostrategic importance.

If instability is prolonged, the search for alternative routes appears as an obvious necessity. In fact, this is already being done. In addition to the one around Africa, others could be explored to link Asia and Europe: the Arctic one, limited for environmental and geopolitical reasons, could contribute, although probably modestly, to alleviate the status.

Others that combine land and maritime sections could also do so. But this last option is complicated by the orography and the difficulty of finding routes that avoid conflict-ridden areas, or that do not give China the key to access them.

Given the difficulties that global supply chains have experienced in less than five years (the confinement caused by Covid-19, the war in Ukraine and now the attacks on entrance in the Red Sea), it is pertinent to consider how to mitigate their vulnerability, whether they should be redesigned and even whether free and globalized trade as we know it today is still viable.

Issues such as redundancy in supply chains and diversification of suppliers and markets make it possible to create resilient systems that ensure the flow of resources. Rethinking the balance between zero-stock and build-up logistics to achieve greater autonomy would help cushion the effects of a disruption such as the one now being experienced in the Red Sea.

The other issue is how to create an environment that restores freedom of navigation through the Suez Canal. The United States launched Operation Prosperity Guardian, which has not been supported by all the countries that trade through the canal and has also generated misgivings among those who see it as an undesirable alignment with Israel or as a sure path to the regional extension of the war in Gaza.

It will be difficult to find a solution that does not involve an increase in costs in all the links that make up global supply chains. Rather, it is a question of calculating whether this increase compensates for what could be lost if the current status , which is increasingly subject to the instability of the international system, is maintained.