Supply-chain professionals see policy uncertainty as the hardest risk to plan around
Supply-chain risk eased slightly from the previous quarter’s sharp increase, but uncertainty remains a central concern for the final months of 2026, according to the Lehigh Business Supply Chain Risk Management Index.
The fourth-quarter index found that transportation disruption remained the highest-rated risk category, despite declining from its record high in the third quarter. Yet when respondents were required to rank ten risk categories directly against one another, government intervention emerged as the clear top concern.
That contrast is the most consequential finding in the new survey. Transportation and economic pressures were viewed as the risks most likely to worsen over the coming three months. But policy and tariff uncertainty ranked higher when supply-chain professionals were forced to identify the issue that matters most overall.
Operational disruption remains the immediate pressure
Transportation disruption risk was still well above its three-year average, even after its quarter-to-quarter decline. Respondents pointed to several overlapping pressures: the unresolved conflict with Iran, fuel-price volatility, driver shortages connected to tighter federal enforcement, and fourth-quarter peak-season capacity constraints and surcharges.
Each of those factors can affect the practical movement of goods. Fuel volatility can complicate transportation costs, while capacity constraints and surcharges can make seasonal planning more difficult. Driver shortages add another pressure to an already constrained operating environment.
The index therefore portrays an industry managing immediate execution challenges, not simply watching a distant macroeconomic signal. Transportation was the highest-rated category in the survey’s individual risk assessments, making it the most prominent near-term concern reported by respondents.
Economic and cyber risks stay close behind
Economic risk followed transportation disruption in the survey’s risk ratings. Respondents cited energy costs, persistent inflation, a high cost of capital and labor shortages. These pressures can interact with transportation disruption: higher energy costs affect freight and operations, while expensive capital can limit the flexibility businesses have to add inventory, capacity or technology.
Cybersecurity and data risk also edged up in the fourth-quarter reading. Respondents cited AI-enabled attacks that are outpacing defensive measures, state actors, seasonal phishing and exposure through third-party vendors during the holiday period.
The result places cybersecurity alongside conventional supply-chain concerns rather than outside them. Modern supply chains depend on data, connected vendors and coordination across logistics, purchasing and delivery. The survey’s respondents identified those links as a source of growing risk during a high-volume seasonal period.
Why forced rankings produced a different answer
The index uses two views of risk. In the category ratings, transportation disruption was highest and economic risk was close behind. In the head-to-head comparison, respondents ranked all ten broad risk categories against one another. Government intervention was the leading concern, followed by economic risk, transportation disruption, and cybersecurity and data risk.
Zach G. Zacharia, director of Lehigh University’s Center for Supply Chain Research, said the gap between those two views is the story of the quarter. In the index’s account, transportation and economic pressures are the risks respondents expect to deteriorate most over the next three months. Government intervention, however, carries special weight because tariff and policy uncertainty sits upstream of sourcing, pricing and transportation decisions.
That upstream role helps explain the ranking. A company can prepare for some operational disruptions through routing, capacity planning or supplier coordination. Policy uncertainty can be harder to incorporate when it affects the assumptions behind sourcing choices, prices and transport plans at the same time.
A planning signal for the fourth quarter
The Lehigh Business Supply Chain Risk Management Index was launched in 2020 by the Center for Supply Chain Research at Lehigh and the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals. It ranks ten broad categories of supply-chain risk and is intended to help executives and managers anticipate issues likely to become significant in the following quarter.
The fourth-quarter 2026 results do not point to one isolated disruption. Instead, they show a cluster of connected risks: transportation constraints, energy and inflation pressures, labor shortages, cyber exposure and policy uncertainty. The distinction between immediate operational risks and the risks that most shape planning is critical for leaders deciding where to focus attention.
For logistics and procurement teams, the survey suggests that a lower transportation reading than the prior quarter should not be interpreted as a return to normal. Transportation disruption remains elevated compared with its three-year average. At the same time, the direct ranking of government intervention signals that companies are concerned about changes that may affect decisions before goods enter the network.
Uncertainty is the common thread
The report’s central message is not that one category has displaced all others. Transportation disruption was still the highest-rated risk, economic conditions remained close behind, and cyber risk increased. But respondents judged government intervention to be the most consequential concern when comparing the full set of risks.
That outcome reflects the difficulty of planning when tariff and policy conditions are unsettled. In the fourth quarter, supply-chain leaders are balancing the immediate demands of peak-season logistics with uncertainty that reaches into sourcing, pricing and transport. The index gives that uncertainty a clear priority in the industry’s risk outlook.
This article is based on reporting by Phys.org. Read the original article.
Originally published on phys.org
