Disease genomes identified by region’s scientists
Will shoppers shun high streets as Britain turns to self isolation?
THE OUTBREAK of coronavirus is leading shoppers to shun Yorkshire’s beleaguered high streets and instead turn to the internet to make vital purchases.
Multiple sources told The Yorkshire Post that purchases of groceries from supermarkets remained strong, but that there had been a significant increase in shoppers using online delivery services instead of actually visiting stores.
Retail experts and bosses were unanimous in the view that supply chains with British supermarkets remained solid and there was contingency planning in place to ensure stores could operate effectively if they were hit by staff shortages owing to the virus.
However, concerns are mounting about the longer-term impact on non-food retail, with uncertainty over the economy and job security potentially set to deter households from purchasing expensive items.
And with the likelihood that the need for social isolation will increase in the weeks and months ahead, there were warnings that the virus outbreak could be damaging for Yorkshire’s “experience economy” in which households prefer to spend money on activities rather than physical items.
Sue Richardson, KPMG’s North head of retail, told The Yorkshire Post that the picture for the UK’s retail sector was very mixed.
“People are still absolutely buying food,” she said.
“There has been some panic buying in certain lines. The businesses I have been talking to have seen a big uptick in online sales.
“But generally, food is performing fine at the moment.”
Much of the reason for food supplies proving robust comes from the planning retailers carried out last year in preparation for a no-deal Brexit scenario.
Ms Richardson said: “The situation is very different, clearly. But there had already been a thought process with lots of them around understanding their supply chains and actually trying to mitigate the risk or dual supply.”
Another key concern will be the impact on retail owing to staff
shortages as more and more people are diagnosed with the virus.
Ms Richardson said stores were “already thinking about how they re-deploy the workforce that allows them to service store demand”.
Her colleague Jon Parker, a director in KPMG’s restructuring practice, said: “I think retailers are hoping there will be a lot
Sue Richardson, head of retail for accountants KPMG North of goodwill in their employees throughout this to help see them through what is going to be a challenging time.”
Concerns for non-food retail persist, however, as households hold off on purchases while uncertainty mounts.
Mr Parker said: “The biggest challenge is going to be for the non-food discretionary promises. There could be a scenario where people see less footfall in stores and that could have a big impact.”
Sources across Yorkshire confirmed that disruption to supply chains from China are already hitting sales and causing delays.
Mark Goldstone, the head of business representation and policy at West and North Yorkshire Chamber of Commerce, said: “Impacts from coronavirus on regional supply chains, especially those coming from China, have been felt across our regional manufacturing base resulting in slowing domestic sales.
“This compounds pressures already being felt from global trade wars and geopolitical tensions which have slowed regional export growth since late 2018.”
Mr Goldstone also said he had seen many companies already introducing new working practices, including splitting teams across sites, home-working and limiting “face-to-face staff engagement with external parties”.
A report from the York, North Yorkshire and East Riding Local Enterprise Partnership – seen by
– confirmed that food manufacturers in the region were actually seeing an increase in demand, and that most larger businesses have implemented a reduction to international and non-essential travel.
Wednesday’s Budget included a raft of measures to protect small businesses from the fallout.
But Beckie Hart, the CBI’s regional director, called on the Government to widen these to larger firms which she said were often “anchors of their communities”.
“While some of the big players can dip into their coffers, they do not have an endless pot of money,” she said.
“The Government is going to have to widen its measures of support.”
NO SALE:
SCIENTISTS IN Yorkshire are contributing to the efforts to track Covid-19 and investigate how it is spreading throughout the population after sequencing the first two whole genomes of the virus.
Using data from patients treated in the UK, scientists at the University of Sheffield have worked out the way some of the new coronavirus’s genetic material is ordered.
The genomes have been published to the international viral sequence database, GISAID, to help track the virus.
Increasing the amount of sequence data available will provide crucial information to scientists around the world about the origins of coronavirus cases in the UK, revealing how the virus may change over time.
Dr Thushan de Silva, a consultant in infectious diseases, who is leading the work taking place at the University of Sheffield, said: “As a virus travels we know it can mutate as it reacts to the genetics of localised populations, creating different strains which may behave in different ways to treatments, vaccines and our body’s immune response.
“Generation of sequence data is vital to track this process.
“This data, used alongside published samples from our international partners, will be crucial for us to see the trends in these mutations.”
Separately, Frontier IP, a UK-based specialist in commercialising university intellectual property, has revealed one its businesses has started working on a Covid-19 vaccine for animals.
The Vaccine Group, which was spun out from the University of Plymouth, said it is working in partnership with two other organisations.
Businesses I have been talking to have seen a big uptick in online sales.