Construction supply chain resilience in catastrophic events

In the wake of a number of catastrophic events, construction supply chain (CSC) vulnerability has become a major issue in the industry. Construction organisations today focus on strategies to minimise the impact of catastrophic events and manage risk by creating more resilient supply chains. However, there is lack of a mechanism to minimise the impact of catastrophic event on CSC. Therefore, this chapter focuses on the impact of catastrophic events on CSC and proposes a strategic framework to minimise their ultimate impact on the construction organisations. This aim is achieved through a comprehensive literature review, preliminary investigation and structured questionnaire survey. According to findings, most likely catastrophes that disrupt CSC are non-terrorist events and in fact are not always the most severe catastrophes. The aggregate effect of likelihood and severity revealed that disruption to transportation has the extreme risk level on CSC, while the most significant impact of catastrophic events is business failure and least significant impact is loss of focus to work. Thus, the catastrophic event risk minimisation strategic framework presented in this chapter will assist construction organisations to identify most suitable strategic actions to minimise the impact of catastrophic events on CSC in order to create resilient construction industry