Due to COVID-19, the supply chains have been disrupted in many ways. This chapter aims to identify the strategies that can help the MSMEs develop a resilient supply chain strategy that can handle any kind of disruption. Five strategies are determined from the literature review. A questionnaire is being developed for survey-based research in the MSMEs of India. For data analysis, exploratory factor analysis and structural equation modelling are used. In this research, an empirical investigation is carried out to present the research framework. All the proposed hypotheses are accepted, and the developed model satisfied all the parameters.
TopIntroduction
COVID-19 is a virus that infects large numbers of people. Many countries are experiencing significant difficulties as a result of the pandemic. Human lives are lost, and economic activity is slowed. Many industries face problems as their strategies for dealing with the pandemic must be revised (P Barbieri, 2020). The company supply chain (SC) and global SC faced numerous challenges, including seaport closures, airport closures, vehicle movement restrictions, and many others (Antai & Mutshinda, 2021). The COVID-19 outbreak has reduced reliance on the global SC, causing the entire network to collapse. According to Fortune (2020), 94 per cent of the world's top 1000 companies experienced SC disruptions due to the COVID-19 outbreak (D. Das et al., 2021). The SC's uncertainty has grown as a result of the frequent COVID-19 disruptions.
India's Micro Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) sector is the second-largest job creator after agriculture. The MSME sector will play an essential role within this target, contributing to GDP expected to exceed 50%. The potential of the Indian MSME sector remains untapped, which is one of the reasons why government policies are now more convergent toward creating a resilient ecosystem with greater breadth and depth. It fills in as a good place for business people and pioneers, with critical help in reinforcing the business environment. The assessed number of MSMEs in India is 63 million, with 110 million utilized (S. Das et al., 2020). Various reports, research, and surveys have repeatedly demonstrated that this sector catalyzes the country's socio-economic development. All of this becomes even more important in light of the government's new mission of reaching a $5 trillion economic target by 2025 (Roy et al., 2020).
The declaration of a cross country lockdown tossed MSME proprietors, businesses, and outside partners into a surprising circumstance where nobody had experience managing such a circumstance. The drawn-out lockdown adversely affected completed merchandise supply, unrefined substance acquisition, and representative accessibility to work underway and supply measures. From April to June 2020, the area confronted difficulties identified with obligation reimbursement, compensation/pay rates, legal contribution, etc. (S. Das et al., 2020; Sahoo & Ashwani, 2020). As per review results, disturbances brought about by the Covid-19 pandemic decreased MSMEs profit by 20-50 per cent, with miniature and little endeavours enduring the worst part of the blow, attributable to a liquidity crunch. As far as hindered yet unsurprising incomes, industries in the fundamental item business fared better (Shafi et al., 2020). A few undertakings have advanced by moving their concentration from unnecessary items to essential products, for example, hand sanitizer and toiletries, PPE units, reusable covers, etc., and can get by in testing times (Chaudhary et al., 2020).
MSMEs in remote areas faced numerous challenges due to disrupted SC systems and intrastate lockdown provisions (Barbate et al., 2021). Consumers have less disposable income as a result of the challenges faced by businesses. Numerous organizations laid off specialists because of a failure to pay compensations, abandoned their workplaces to try not to bring about costs, and ended creation because of a drop famous. Equivocalness in future exchange and the arrival of the new typical keeps monetary organizations from expanding any new monetary loaning or covering likely danger (Majumdar et al., 2020). Likewise, the area has replies to basic inquiries like joblessness, neighborhood economic turn of events, financial shortfall, exchange balance, monetary area advancement, SDG arrangement, etc. Private area investment in different bottlenecks of the worth chain and inventory network framework is fundamental for the public authority's various strategies. In India, organizations of all sizes face natural substance obtainment, credit prerequisites, market linkages, quality, normalization, evaluating, business turnaround time, campaigning, and numerous others (Esra Sipahi, 2020).