Kees Boersma, & Robert Larruina. (2021). Restoring the Medical Supply Chain from Below: The Role of Social Entrepreneurship in the Production of Face Masks during the Covid-19 Crisis. In Anouck Adrot, Rob Grace, Kathleen Moore, & Christopher W. Zobel (Eds.), ISCRAM 2021 Conference Proceedings – 18th International Conference on Information Systems for Crisis Response and Management (pp. 260–269). Blacksburg, VA (USA): Virginia Tech.
Abstract: The COVID-19 pandemic hit societies all over the world deeply. Since it has affected societies worldwide and compromised socio-technical systems across geographical, judicial and administrative borders it can be considered a cross-border, transboundary crisis. This dimension has exposed the global medical supply chain's vulnerability. Due to its 'lean and mean' characteristics the supply chain was unable to function adequately during the crisis and formal authorities struggled to restore it, causing serious problems in the response to the pandemic. At the same time, numerous initiatives from below tried to give a (partial) answer on how to restore the broken supply chain. This paper presents a case study about a Dutch social enterprise (i.e. the Refugee Company) engaged with the cross-border dimension of the COVID-19 crisis. The Refugee Company set up a supply chain, operation and (domestic) production of personal protection equipment (PPE) materials, in particular face masks. The paper draws on data collected through qualitative methods, including document analysis (secondary sources), interviews and observations. The conclusion is that social entrepreneurs and enterprises played a crucial role in restoring the supply chain. The paper provides valuable lessons for both policy makers and crisis managers: there is great potential in recognizing the entrepreneurial activities from below in strengthening supply chains at times of crisis, potentially making them more sustainable and resilient.
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Boris Petrenj, Mariachiara Piraina, Giada Feletti, Paolo Trucco, Valentina Urbano, & Stefano Gelmi. (2021). Cross-border Information Sharing for Critical Infrastructure Resilience: Requirements and Platform Architecture. In Anouck Adrot, Rob Grace, Kathleen Moore, & Christopher W. Zobel (Eds.), ISCRAM 2021 Conference Proceedings – 18th International Conference on Information Systems for Crisis Response and Management (pp. 247–259). Blacksburg, VA (USA): Virginia Tech.
Abstract: Resilience of Critical Infrastructures is high on the agenda of countries' efforts. Modern CI highly interdependent and span countries, so disruptions occurring on one side of the border can significantly affect economic and social functions on the other. To build CI resilience, stakeholder organizations must collaborate and exchange information throughout the Emergency Management cycle. In this paper, we present the Critical Infrastructure Platform (PIC in Italian) which is being developed within the SICt project (Resilience of Cross-Border Critical Infrastructure). PIC is a technological piece of a broader cross-border regional resilience strategy between Lombardy Region (Italy) and Canton Ticino (Switzerland) aiming to improve the capacity to manage accidental events involving transportation CI between the two countries. The main goal of the PIC platform is to support secure and effective information-sharing, inter-organizational risk assessment, monitoring and operational coordination under critical situations. The paper presents the key requirements of such ICT system, its high-level architecture including the description of its main modules, main takeaways and future steps.
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