Just about everything we eat or wear or use at home or at work has been brought from somewhere distant – sometimes the other side of the world. A vast web of intricate global supply chains coordinate the movement of container ships and freight planes and lorries to an ever-increasing pitch of timing precision.

But, says Prof. Aseem Kinra of Heriot-Watt University, the more that we optimise a system, the less resilient it is to any disruption – which in an increasingly uncertain world we have now to expect. He looks at the risks to supply chains and possible ways in which an island community can build resilience.