Building resilient food supply chains in the UAE is mission-critical

From a supply chain and procurement perspective, how secure are our food sources in the UAE? Arun Bruce, CEO of TransformationX, sheds light on the answer and emphasizes why it is mission-critical to build more resilient supply chains.

The Arabian Peninsula has been long associated with arid climatic conditions and limited water resources. Despite these fundamental challenges, both the UAE and KSA rank among the top 50 nations in the Global Food Security Index by Economist Impact – a credible feat indeed. This performance stems from proactive government efforts focused on boosting self-sufficiency, investing in food-tech, and securing diversified global supply chains.

While food security is high, most of the GCC countries have long grappled with a structural vulnerability-import reliance. The UAE for example imports over 85% of its food. This reliance on global sources exposes the nation to risks including price volatility, climate disruptions, and geopolitical uncertainty.

Recent global events have only magnified these threats, underscoring the urgency of building resilience through strategic procurement, technological innovation, and global partnerships. In a survey run by TransformationX and GPCA in the second half of 2024, supply chain leaders in the GCC ranked global war and trade route disruption as the risks they were most worried about.

Local initiatives

GCC governments have begun massive localisation programmes across industries, including in agriculture. UAE’s National Food Security Strategy targets 50% local agricultural production by 2051. Saudi Arabia aims to localise 85% of its food processing by the end of the decade. Innovations such as hydroponics, vertical farming, Al-enabled precision agriculture are all powering this aggressive localisation.

Food Tech Valley in the UAE exemplifies this push, acting as a hub for climate-smart farming solutions. While these advances are promising, domestic production alone cannot meet national demand.

Building supply chain resilience

For GCC countries, international procurement remains indispensable to food security. To navigate increasing global volatility and ensure uninterrupted access to food sources, GCC countries must proactively build supply chain resilience across five core levers: supply chain visibility, operational flexibility, risk processes, international collaboration, and organisational capability.

Supply chain visibility is foundational enabled by predictive analytics and digitised control towers that allow real-time monitoring of critical variables such as rainfall in sourcing regions, shifts in freight rates, or early signs of geopolitical disruption. Such advanced visibility at country and corporate levels can ensure agile sourcing to keep prices low and availability high.

This visibility feeds directly into flexibility, where tools like supplier diversification, distributed production networks, and diversified logistics infrastructure help absorb shocks and adapt to disruptions. Current flexibility strategies could be made more agile by investing further in localised production clusters, establishing alternative warehousing and logistics hubs across the region, and maintaining standby supplier agreements that can be quickly activated in crisis scenarios.

Risk processes such as agile inventory norms, structured business continuity plans, and dedicated risk governance bodies provide the backbone for consistent and rapid response. Trade agreements such as the UAE-India Food Corridor serve as structural buffers, but the evolving nature of global risks demands these processes to be stress-tested more frequently, integrated across supply tiers, and aligned with dynamic scenario planning models.

Meanwhile, collaboration, particularly through strong supplier relationships and global partnerships remains essential. The UAE-US climate-smart farming initiative, recently expanded to $29.2 billion, reflecting a commitment to co-developing sustainable solutions. Deeper collaboration is needed across all supply tiers, especially with smaller producers in vulnerable regions, to build mutual resilience.

Strengthening supplier relationship management frameworks, expanding regional knowledge-sharing platforms, and ensuring contingency planning is built into contracts are areas still ripe for development.

Finally, organisational and people capability provide the cultural and structural foundation for resilience. From leadership support to risk management training and risk capability building, regional organisations can do a lot to ensure resilience becomes systemic. While there has been growing awareness, many organisations, especially smaller players within the ecosystem, still lack structured programmes to build these capabilities.

A comprehensive approach

Together, these interconnected levers form a comprehensive strategy shifting the region to higher levels of resilience.

As the UAE redefines its approach to food security, building resilient, tech-driven, and globally integrated supply chains is no longer optional – it is absolutely mission-critical. In navigating this new normal, supply chain and procurement strategies will play a decisive role in securing the country's food future.