Government
Relevance 4/5- Exposure
- Not specified in v0.2
- Actions
- Map tier-two dependence for the 20 most critical inputs
- Set stockpile grades, not just volumes
- Pre-qualify alternative suppliers
- Watch
- Licence approval times
Likelihood, two years5Highly likelyto end-2028
Likelihood, ten years5Highly likelyto end-2036
Systemic impact3Significantglobal
National impact4Severetypical highly exposed nation
OnsetSudden
Duration (acute phase)1 year
Warning timeDays
ScopeGlobal
Recovery horizonYears
Capability loadHard 1/3Soft 1/3Economic 1/3domains loaded High
ConcurrencyStandalonetriggers 3 · triggered by 3
Confidence · movementhighnew
Rated at Standard Severe. Likelihood type: systemic. Source of scores: ginc-desk-v0.2.
03Narrative
Dateline: February 2028
The licence regime is announced as 'orderly'. Within a month, applications are backing up and approval depends on end-use declarations that no automotive supplier can honestly complete. A tier-two parts maker in Bavaria stops shipping door-control modules; the assembly plant runs out of them on day nine. In Hyderabad, a generics manufacturer learns that its intermediate supplier has lost its export permit, and a hospital pharmacy in Lusaka learns it three months later when the tender fails. Fertiliser buyers in East Africa discover that the alternative source has already been contracted by larger buyers at twice the price. Governments convene task forces, publish lists of critical inputs and discover they do not know the second and third tiers of their own supply chains. Stockpiles that looked ample on a spreadsheet turn out to be the wrong grade. Eighteen months in, two new refineries and one packaging plant have been announced; none is running. The supplier offers to resume exports to governments that sign side-letters on unrelated matters, and several do.
The dateline is illustrative, not a forecast. The narrative is hypothetical; the historical anchors below are real events.
04Summary
The dominant supplier of a critical input halts or licenses exports for a year. The input may be rare earth magnets, legacy semiconductors, active pharmaceutical ingredients, fertiliser, lithography tools or cloud compute. Substitution takes 18 to 36 months. Production lines, hospitals and farms discover their exposure through stoppages rather than audits. v0.2 widened this scenario from minerals and chips to any input with a supplier share above 40 per cent, following Norway's drug-shortage scenario and the Nexperia stoppage.
05Historical anchors
| Event | Date | What happened | Calibrates |
|---|---|---|---|
| Nexperia export halt | October 2025 | After the Dutch government took control of Nexperia on 30 September, China blocked exports from Nexperia's Chinese plants; European and Japanese carmakers warned of line stoppages within weeks | speed of stoppage; legacy chips |
| China rare earth controls | April and October 2025 | Licensing of heavy rare earths and magnets; one-year suspension agreed 30 October 2025 | licensing as coercion |
| China rare earth embargo on Japan | September 2010 | Informal halt of exports for about two months during the Senkaku dispute | precedent and recovery |
| Global semiconductor shortage | 2021–2022 | Vehicle production cut by millions of units; lead times beyond 50 weeks | substitution lead times |
| Norway AKS 'drug shortage' scenario | 2019 | National scenario of pharmaceutical supply failure | medicines as critical input |
| Fertiliser and Black Sea | 2022 | Potash and nitrogen export disruption; prices doubled | fertiliser pathway |
06Parameters
Shown at their preset values. Parameters are not adjustable in this release and nothing on this page is computed from them. Custom settings run (Phase B) but are labelled 'non-standard run' and excluded from comparisons.
Common sliders at Standard Severe · read-only
1. Severity
majorsevere (Standard Severe)extreme
2. Duration (acute phase)
30 days90 days1 year (Standard Severe)3 years5 years
3. Onset
sudden (Standard Severe)rapid (weeks)gradual (years)
4. Warning time
nonedays (Standard Severe)months
5. Scope
nationalregionalglobal (Standard Severe)
6. Origin
naturalaccidentaladversarial (great power / neighbour / non-state) (Standard Severe)
Standard Severe: adversarial (great power)
7. External support
fullpartial (Standard Severe)none
8. Concurrency
standalone (Standard Severe)plus one named scenarioplus two
9. Policy response assumed
none (pure exposure)current plans executed (Standard Severe)best practice
Standard Severe: current plans
10. Recovery horizon
monthsyears (Standard Severe)structural
Scenario-specific parameters · read-only
| Parameter | Default | Range or options | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Input class | rare earth magnets | options: legacy chips / APIs / fertiliser / lithography tools / cloud compute | — |
| Supplier share of global supply | 70 per cent | 40–95 | — |
| Substitution lead time | 24 months | 6–48 | — |
| National stockpile coverage | 3 months | 0–12 | — |
| Licensing versus outright ban | licensing | — | Ban at Extreme |
07Transmission channels
- Export halt or licence backlog.
- Tier-two and tier-three stoppages surface within weeks.
- Price spike on alternative sources; larger buyers pre-empt supply.
- Production cuts, hospital shortages, planting delays.
- Side-letter diplomacy and selective resumption.
08Capability loading
High: capability band shifts expected under current plans. Medium: band shifts under 'none' policy response only. Low: strain without band shift. Loads are judgement-based until the Atlas connects. Domains link to the Atlas.
| Domain | Load | Channel |
|---|---|---|
| Hard | ||
| Critical technology | High | chips, tools, materials for electronics and defence |
| Defence and security | Medium | munitions and platform components |
| Strategic infrastructure | Low | grid and transport components |
| Soft | ||
| Government effectiveness | High | supply-chain visibility, stockpile policy, licensing diplomacy |
| Human capital | Medium | medicines and health outcomes |
| Influence and cohesion | Low | public trust in government competence |
| Economic | ||
| Industry, trade and supply | High | stoppages, substitution cost |
| Macro-financial | Low | sectoral output and inflation |
| Energy and resources | Medium | transition materials; fertiliser and food |
09Stakeholders
Technology
Relevance 3/5- Exposure
- Not specified in v0.2
- Actions
- Inventory bills of materials to the component level
- Dual-source where the supplier share exceeds 50 per cent
- Watch
- Export-control notices
Investors
Relevance 3/5- Exposure
- Not specified in v0.2
- Actions
- Identify single-supplier exposure in portfolio companies
- Watch
- Lead-time indices
Public
Relevance 2/5- Exposure
- Medicine availability
- Actions
- Not specified in v0.2
- Watch
- Pharmacy shortage lists
10Regional exposure
| Region | Exposure | Rationale |
|---|---|---|
| North America | Medium | — |
| Europe | High | Automotive, machinery, generic medicines |
| China | Low | Low as supplier, Medium as importer of tools |
| Indo-Pacific | High | Electronics assembly |
| South Asia | Medium | API intermediates, fertiliser |
| Gulf and Middle East | Low | — |
| Africa | High | Fertiliser, medicines, no stockpiles |
| Latin America and Caribbean | Medium | — |
| Russia and Eurasia | Medium | — |
11Early-warning indicators
| Indicator | Source | Threshold |
|---|---|---|
| Export licence approval times and denial rates | — | — |
| Supplier concentration by HS code | UN Comtrade | — |
| Lead-time indices | ISM, IHS | — |
| Pharmacy shortage registers | EMA, FDA | — |
| Fertiliser price indices | World Bank | — |
| Announced capacity for alternative supply versus commissioning dates | — | — |
12Compounds
- Triggers
- Triggered by
- Amplifying trends
- supply-chain concentrationjust-in-time inventoriesenergy-transition material demand
- Key trends
- Supply-chain concentrationCriticalExport controls & economic statecraftCriticalEconomic security policyCriticalDeglobalisationCriticalTaiwan Strait tensionCriticalAdvanced semiconductorsCriticalPharmaceutical supply concentrationCriticalAI chips & accelerator supplyCriticalRare earth processing concentrationCriticalLithography & chip-tool chokepointsCriticalStrategic stockpiles & reservesCriticalCritical minerals supplyCriticalGreat-power competitionVery highFriend-shoring & regional trade blocsVery highJust-in-time logistics & thin inventoriesVery highFertiliser dependenceVery highReshoring & localised manufacturingVery highRegional medicines manufacturingVery high
From the GINC 250: trends rated Very high or Critical for this scenario. All S02 trend scores.
13Rating rationale
| Rating | Band or level | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Likelihood, two years | 5Highly likely | Two Standard Severe episodes in 2025 alone. |
| Likelihood, ten years | 5Highly likely | — |
| Systemic impact | 3Significant | Sectoral rather than economy-wide, but global in reach. |
| National impact | 4Severe | For manufacturing economies without stockpiles. |
| Confidence | high | — |
Source of scores: ginc-desk-v0.2. Confidence refers to the rating, not the scenario. Calibration sources are listed with the anchors above and on the methodology page.
14Open questions
Contested assumptions for the panel to resolve.
- Whether cloud compute and frontier models belong here or in S13.
- How to treat 'friendly' supplier concentration (lithography tools) versus adversarial.
15Commentary
No signed commentary in this build.
16Version and citation
- Version
0.2.0· active- Change log
- Full change log
0.2.0· 2 October 2026 · Entered the Library at v0.2 with GINC desk scores.
Cite as
GINC (2027). Scenario S02 Single-supplier cut-off, Scenario Library v0.2. scenarios.ginc.org/library/single-supplier-cut-offContent and data are published under CC BY 4.0.