It should come as no surprise that the Chemical Manufacturing Industry, like all industries, has experienced quite a shake up this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Global supply chain disruption, erratic spikes and lulls in demand, operational constraints and the nature of on-site jobs are just a few of many obstacles that the Chemicals industry faced as a result of the pandemic.

Let’s consider some chemical industry statistics that frame the impacts of these constraints on the global economy…

According to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics from data in September 2020, Chemical Manufacturing companies employ roughly 838,000 people in the United States alone, of that 838k roughly 524,000 are production and nonsupervisory employees.

The below figures are according to statista.com: 

In 2019, the Chemical Industry represented a total worldwide revenue of roughly 3.94 trillion U.S. dollars, with China controlling a 35.8% share of the revenue.

The leading Global Manufacturer of Chemicals, based on a revenue of approximately 65.3 billion U.S. dollars, was German chemical company, BASF. They were also the leaders in the category of global employment with approximately 118,280 employees.

In the United Kingdom the chemical and pharmaceuticals industry represent the second largest industry and a significantly important part of the national economy.

Based on this small sample of statistics alone, it is very clear to see that the Chemical Manufacturing Industry represents a significant part of our global economy. The good news is that as we learn more about the virus and find creative strategies to combat it, including artificial intelligence applied in various ways, we are already starting to see the Global Chemical Production rebounding from some pretty significant losses.

The changes in this chart illustrate the

Monthly global chemical production change due to COVID-19 by region 2020:

Percent change in chemical production due to COVID-19 worldwide between January 2020 and August 2020, by region GIObal Africa & Middle East Chile Latin America Mexico North America India China Asia. Pacific Former Soviet union Belgium Italy France Europe January 2020 to Februa ry -2.1% 0.1% 2.3% -0.4% -0.1% -6.4% -3.7% -0.9% 0.5% February 2020 to March -3.3% 0.2% -2.5% -1.1% -7.2% -8.3% -5.4% 2% -0.8% -2.1% 0.2% March 2020 to April 0.1% -8% -3.4% -2.9% -2.6% -15.9% 1% -0.4% -0.1% -5% -4.2% -2.3% April 2020 to May -0.5% -0.9% -10.2% -4.9% -6.5% -2.3% -13.7% 4.8% 1% -3.3% -3.9% -3.1% May 2020 to June 2020 1.6% -1.2% -6.7% -3.2% -1.9% 1.1% 6.5% 3.3% 3.7% 0.9% 0.2% June 2020 to L July 1.7% 0.3% -1.9% 0.5% -1.1% 1% 17.6% 2.1% 1.7% 1.9% 2.8% 5% 3.2% 3% July 2020 August • 2020 2.7% 2.9% 4% 0.9% 10.3% 3.3% 2.9% 1.3% 2.6% 4.9% 1.7% 3.6%
Source: Statista

Global production is rebounding slowly, but surely, with a 2.7% uptick in production from July of 2020 to August of 2020 with the most significant increase coming from India after a pretty difficult downturn due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The rebound in this industry is pivotal to the health of our global economy, as illustrated by the statistics above which represent how important chemical manufacturing is.

What steps have the Chemical Manufacturers taken in order to begin rebounding quickly and contributing to our global economy?

Many Chemical Manufacturers have turned to Artificial Intelligence and Digitization in order to combat challenges presented by COVID-19 whether they are applying these technologies to part of their process or to their entire estate.

Let’s take the international race to find a vaccine as an example. Many corporations have worked together to use Artificial Intelligence to rapidly increase the ability to find a treatment. Dan Drapeau, Head of Technology at Blue Fountain Media, has posited that Artificial Intelligence, when applied in the capacity of finding a vaccine, has become “a necessity right now, because we’re in the middle of a global pandemic, and it’s vital for us to figure out a solution or vaccine therapy as soon as possible.“

Mefuparib PARPI SARS-cov-2 Toremifene Viral RNA NSP14 RNA-dependent RNA polymerase Dexamethasone NR3C1 Remdesivir AAKI Melatonin MTNRIA Baricitinib
Source: The Lancet
AI algorithms can be used for drug repurposing, which is a rapid and cost-effective way to discover new therapy options for emerging diseases.

Artificial Intelligence is a massive disruptor in the vaccination process in regards to reduction of time consumed by molecular analysis and how the molecules should be used in chemical binding to target the disease. In short, humans can’t possibly conduct analysis on the billions of different molecules as it would take far too much time that our global population just doesn’t have. AI has been able to automate this process for the pharmaceutical industry to increase capacity, help predict which drugs would most likely be successful and also decrease the amount of financial resources spent on clinical trials that might ultimately fail.

But Artificial Intelligence’s reach in the chemical industry only begins here and, as a result of the pandemic, it truly has become a necessity for corporations to survive and even thrive in the current environment.

Chemical manufacturers, as well as other industries, all over the world are partnering with Elutions in order harness the power of Maestro’s Artificial intelligence to combat the disruption that COVID-19 has created. Maestro, when applied to the chemical manufacturing process at an estate-wide level, has the ability to transform operations.

To learn more about Digitization and Maestro Artificial Intelligence, stay tuned for Friday’s (Oct. 23) article on Digitization and Quantifying the Impacts of Artificial Intelligence. Also, please read previous articles regarding our work using Artificial Intelligence to combat COVID-19.

Up Next for NCW: Digitization and Chemical Manufacturing

By clicking subscribe, you agree to share your email address with the site owner to receive post updates from the site owner. Use the unsubscribe link in those emails to opt out at any time.

Processing…
Success! You're on the list.

Leave a Reply