Strengthening Resilience of Supply with Essential Goods through Public-Private Emergency Collaborations: Challenges and Incentives

Private actors ensure the supply of essential goods such as food, drinking water, and medicine to
the population. However, crises such as natural disasters, human-caused conflicts, or pandemics
can cause disruptions of private supply chains and, subsequently, supply shortages in the market.
In this case, public actors need to become active and responsible for supplying the population with
essential goods. Nevertheless, the ability of public actors to provide essential goods in a crisis is
constrained due to limited resources and a lack of knowledge about the relevant commercial supply
chains. Therefore, companies that produce, distribute, or sell essential goods can be valuable
partners but must be adequately motivated to participate in crisis management. A promising
form of collaboration to strengthen resilience lies in the concept of public-private emergency
collaborations (PPECs), elaborated in different studies within the dissertation. The necessity of
PPECs and their public acceptance depends on the attitude and preparation of the population, which
is why the empirical investigation of these accompanying questions is another central part of the
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dissertation.

Five studies published as companion articles address necessary prerequisites and approaches to the
design of collaborations in crises: Study A examines the PPEC concept and puts it into a more
specific framework, considering logistical requirements in a game-theoretic model. The model
addresses private actors’ incentives to collaborate, such as a positive reputation or learning effects
for internal processes. Both can provide a substantial —- not least financial —- advantage for the
company in the long run. Study B investigates crises and PPECs from a company perspective by
evaluating an empirical study with 398 responses from essential goods and logistics companies.
The results show companies’ high interest in participating in PPECs. Nevertheless, the data reveals
that certain conditions, such as adequate compensation or consideration of companies’ operational
procedures, must be fulfilled for collaboration with public actors. Study C addresses the attitude
of the population in a survey of 402 randomly selected participants and finds that the population
highly values companies’ involvement in PPECs. The companies’ communication strategy and
the population’s risk perception affect the attitude. Study D analyzes the stockpiling behavior of
the population in two door-to-door surveys, the first with 330 participants and the second with
402. The timing of the before-and-after survey provides a special value: The study considers
possible changes due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The results show low stockpiling levels and that
stockpiling has only marginally increased during the COVID-19 pandemic. Study E examines an
economic experiment with 262 participants in 13 sessions to clarify the importance of safety-stock
levels for companies’ reputation in a failure-prone supply chain. The design made it possible
to disentangle indirect losses due to customer churn and direct losses due to disruptions, thus
quantifying firm reliability and customer loyalty.

Four general recommendations for the stakeholders in crisis management, public actors, private
actors, and the population, are derived: First, all stakeholders must adapt their behavior and improve
current protection measures and strategies against global crises and supply chain disruptions.
Second, humanitarian crisis management is a team effort involving many actors. Therefore,
understanding synergies, mutual attitudes, and the incentive constellation of the actors involved is
a crucial prerequisite for success. Third, crisis management also includes the right communication
strategy. It is not only important to contribute but also to communicate it in a successful and
convincing way. Fourth, collaborative approaches, as in PPECs, where each stakeholder brings his
or her strengths into the collaboration, are beneficial for all parties involved, and increase society’s
overall resilience.

Consequently, this dissertation provides valuable insights into the status of humanitarian crisis
management from the perspective of different stakeholders. It offers the potential to improve
this field of research through collaborative approaches, as in PPECs, addressing the strengths and
incentives of stakeholders accordingly.