Coronavirus and Trade Event Los Angeles World Affairs Council

This morning, I got the chance to attend the Los Angeles World Affairs Council and Town Hall’s event on the coronavirus and the effects it will have on trade and the economy in today’s world. Stephen Cheung moderated and also shared a lot of his own wisdom from being the president of the World Trade Center of Los Angeles. The two panelists were Marisela Caraballo Diruggiero, who is the director of trade development at the Port of Los Angeles, and Christine Peterson, who is also an expert in the field. Christine Peterson began the discussion by explaining that there are three stages in the economic process of a pandemic crisis: the preparedness before the outbreak, the measures taken during the outbreak, and the recovery afterwards. She explained that the United States didn’t take many protective measures before the outbreak, citing the tariffs on trade with China. However, we are already far past the preparedness stage, and we must deal with the problems we see heading our way currently. She explained that the most urgent need right now is to ramp up the production and the importation of medical supplies so that we can properly deal with the virus in medical environments. She explained that right now, the United States urgently needs medical supplies, and that we should take drastic measures to get them. Another thing the panelists talked about was how our American industries are beginning to pivot. They talked about how textile industries and companies are beginning to halt production of their typical items and ramp up production of medical supplies for hospitals and healthcare workers. They also talked about how breweries are producing hand sanitizer instead of whiskey, and about how car companies like Ford and Tesla are set to produce ventilators (of which hundreds of thousands are needed). It was very interesting to hear these speakers talk about the economic side of this virus; talk of the virus and its long term and short term effects seem to be consuming our lives right now, but this new angle was refreshing, and they seemed to have more good news than I would’ve expected.