QIMA Q3 2026 Barometer: Hormuz Fuel Crisis Exposes the Limits of Supply Chain Diversification

TL;DR

The Hormuz fuel crisis exposed a hard truth: Western supply chains have spent years diversifying beyond China, but nearshoring and reshoring haven't scaled fast enough to reduce dependence on Asia as a whole. As Southeast and South Asian fuel shortages strained factory capacity, some Western buyers may be shifting sourcing back to China – while emerging markets face even higher concentration risk. QIMA's Q3 barometer, drawing on product inspection and supplier audit data, examines how 2026's disruptions are reshaping global sourcing concentration and diversification.

Key Takeaways:

• US and EU nearshoring aren't scaling fast enough: Buyers' early response to the Hormuz fuel crisis showed that Western nearshoring capacities still lack scale to meaningfully reduce dependency on Asia.

• China sourcing is re-emerging as the West’s fallback: As fuel shortages constrain South and Southeast Asia's capacity, China is seeing early signs of increased demand from EU and US buyers in Q2.

• Emerging-market buyers deepen China dependency: China now accounts for 78% of their inspection demand outside Asia, rising to 81% in South and Latin America.

• South and Latin America show early diversification promise: intra-regional inspection demand is growing at double-digit rates – still small-scale, but a trend worth watching.

Listen to our Supply Chain Soundbites podcast for a 6-minute breakdown on Asia fuel shortages and Q3 sourcing shifts.

QIMA Supply Chain Snapshot:

Key data points from Q2:

• 35% (highest since 2024): China’s share in North America’s inspection & audit volumes

• 81%: China's share in South and Latin America’s inspection & audit volumes

• +14% YoY (Apr) → -5% YoY (Jun): slumping EU demand for Southeast Asia inspections and audits

Top risks to watch in Q3:

• Fuel shortages limiting diversification options within Asia

• Stalled nearshoring and reshoring momentum

• China concentration risk, especially for emerging markets

US and EU Nearshoring Not Scaling Fast Enough to Reduce Dependence on Asia

The closure of the Strait of Hormuz in late February, and the subsequent fuel shortages across Asia, exposed a layered dependency at the heart of global consumer goods supply chains. The West still relies heavily on Asia for finished goods: over 80% of electronics, toys, and home goods sold in the US and EU are imported from Asia. But many Asian manufacturing hubs, including Vietnam and Bangladesh, are themselves heavily dependent on Middle East fuel imports.

Nearshoring and reshoring were meant to reduce this exposure, but progress has not kept pace. In QIMA’s Global Sourcing Survey, roughly 1 in 2 US and EU businesses regularly report plans to expand nearshoring or reshoring, and over 70% of those plans translate into some action. Yet field data shows the shift remains limited and momentum is slowing: in Q2 2026, nearshoring and reshoring accounted for just 11% of service volumes for QIMA’s EU clients and 7% in North America, both below 2025 averages. Recent research by Kearney and ING Think point to similar constraints.

As a result, when South and Southeast Asian capacity came under strain from the Hormuz fuel crisis, Western supply chains found that their options to redirect demand were still limited.

Figure 1: Intent to nearshore or reshore is widespread among US and EU businesses, and most of it converts into real action.

Western Buyers Edge Back Toward China as Hormuz Fuel Crisis Strains Alternatives

As Southeast and South Asia’s factories came under pressure from fuel shortages, US and EU buyers are starting to shift orders to secure capacity. However, QIMA’s Q2 data suggests that so far, these shifts have stayed within Asia – often moving toward China, where manufacturing, powered mainly by domestic coal and renewables, was more insulated from the Hormuz energy shock than Southeast Asia's fuel-import-dependent factories.

China's share of North America’s service volumes with QIMA hit a six-quarter high of 35% in Q2, while Southeast Asia's share slid to pre-2025 levels. Among EU buyers, Southeast Asia’s share of inspections and audits fell in every month of Q2, tracking a matching drop in demand: from +14% YoY growth in April to -5% YoY contraction in June. EU demand for China inspections, meanwhile, grew through the quarter, finishing Q2 at +10% expansion year-on-year.

Given the lag between orders and inspections, the full Q3 picture is still forming. But early signals already point to how far Western reliance on Asia extends – and how quickly a shift to China becomes the main backup option.

Figure 2: EU inspection demand appears to be shifting back toward China as Southeast Asia's growth reverses sharply following Hormuz-driven fuel shortages.

Emerging-Market Reliance on China Sourcing Drives Concentration Risk

Reliance on Asian imports is not limited to Western buyers. Buyers in emerging markets (EM), including South and Latin America, Eastern Europe, Africa, and the Middle East, are also highly import-dependent for consumer products – and less diversified than developed-market buyers. Their demand is growing and increasingly concentrated in one market: China.

QIMA Q2 data shows demand for China inspections up +18% YoY from emerging-market clients outside Asia. During the same period, China accounted for 78% of all inspection and audit demand among these buyers, rising to 81% for clients in South and Latin America. For developed-market buyers (North America, Western Europe, and Australia/New Zealand combined) the equivalent figure was 50%. With EM buyers already this reliant on one market, the fuel crisis adds another layer of risk: as Southeast Asia’s capacity tightens, they may lean on China even more.

Quality management adds another reason for concentration. QIMA’s product inspection data shows emerging-market shipments fall outside of Acceptable Quality Limits (AQL) more often than developed-market ones. So far in 2026, 26% of EM electronics and electrical orders failed to meet AQL, versus 8% for orders placed by developed-market clients; in homewares, the gap was 18% versus 11%. This likely reflects differences in buyer-side QC maturity more than supplier performance. While buyers in emerging markets are still developing their quality programs, they may keep sourcing concentrated to simplify quality management – at the cost of diversification.

Figure 3: The Beyond AQL gap between emerging- and developed-market buyers has widened in both electronics and homewares over the past year, most sharply in electronics.

South and Latin America's Intra-Regional Trade Points to Nearshoring Opportunities

QIMA’s Q2 2026 data shows double-digit growth in demand for inspections and audits ordered by South and Latin American buyers for intra-regional orders – small in scale, but with wider implications, as sourcing closer to home could ease the region's reliance on imports over time.

This shift lines up with a broader regional push: UNCTAD’s 2025 trade update notes that intra-regional trade made up only 16% of Latin America's total trade in 2025 while CAF, the Development Bank of Latin America, highlights the importance of deeper integration as a resilience strategy. If that momentum builds, these buyers could grow regional sourcing organically, rather than retrofit it later, as many Western buyers are now attempting.

Q3 Outlook: Will the Hormuz Energy Crisis Add Fuel to the West’s Nearshoring Efforts?

QIMA’s barometer has consistently highlighted diversification as a key risk-management strategy – and as an important contributor to 2025’s supply chain resilience. But Q2 data complicates that picture: diversifying across offshore markets, without scaling nearshoring, still left buyers exposed to a shared upstream bottleneck in the Hormuz fuel crisis.

The resulting strain on supplier and shipping capacity shows that not all diversification strategies offer the same resilience. Q3 will reveal whether Western buyers treat this as a one-off shock or a signal to accelerate nearshoring again.