The global food system is under pressure. What once felt stable now teeters on disruption, from erratic weather and trade shifts to new regulations. It’s not enough to react. Resilience now means seeing change coming, and getting ahead of it.
That was the message from Jeroen Lustig (CEO & Co-Founder, A-INSIGHTS) and Shaun Wilken (Market Intelligence Manager, Lamb Weston) at the Transform European Food & Agri 2025 conference. Their joint session, From Reaction to Resilience: How Market Intelligence Drives Proactive Food Supply Chain Strategy, highlighted how intelligence is reshaping supply chain strategy from reactive to proactive.
Why supply chains are more fragile than ever
Take frozen potatoes. A weather hiccup in Europe? Suddenly, French fries in Asia cost more. The chain is global, tightly interlinked, and vulnerable.
“You need to progress fast enough to stay relevant—and ahead,” said Shaun. "That’s tough when you’re constantly firefighting."
To survive, companies must zoom out beyond local disruptions to spot broader risks and shifts. In short: don’t just optimize for today. Prepare for tomorrow.
Staying on track in a storm
One of the most significant and persistent challenges facing the food and agriculture sector is the growing volatility in weather and climate. While these terms are often used interchangeably, they have distinct meanings:
- Weather refers to short-term atmospheric conditions, like rainfall, temperature, or wind patterns, which can change daily or seasonally.
- Climate represents long-term averages and patterns of weather in a particular region over decades.
Jeroen used a meme to illustrate the push-pull: a man walks calmly along a beach while his dog zigzags wildly. The man is your long-term strategy. The dog? Every short-term distraction pulling you off course.
“You see it in the picture over here where… the picture is Neil deGrasse Tyson walking along the beach with his dog… and I think this is the most beautiful picture for me to illustrate what it looks like with short term drivers and long-term drivers overlapping,” said Jeroen Lustig.
Shaun added: “You’ve got to rein in the dog sometimes and stick to the red line.”
In practical terms, this means:
- Keeping focus on long-term goals like climate adaptation and sustainable sourcing.
- Building the flexibility to respond to short-term disruptions like floods, droughts, or trade restrictions caused by crop failures.
- Using data not just to understand what is happening now, but to foresee how current variability could signal long-term transformation.
Companies that succeed in “keeping the red line” are those that don’t allow short-term volatility to derail long-term strategy. Instead, they build systems that integrate both views—reactive enough to stay afloat in the storm, but steady enough to reach the destination.
This dual perspective—short-term agility paired with long-term foresight—is essential for creating true resilience in a warming and increasingly uncertain world.
Making sense of disruptions through the animal kingdom
Disruption comes in many forms. Animal metaphors help make sense of it:
- Black swans: Rare, unpredictable, huge impact (e.g., COVID).
- Cobras: Urgent, eye-catching, often overhyped.
- Grey rhinos: Big, obvious, and charging straight at you—yet often ignored.
Rhinos are the real danger. They’re predictable but paralyzing. Think climate policy shifts, soil degradation, or loss of biodiversity. You see them coming but fail to act—until it’s too late.
“Rhinos don’t change course,” Jeroen warned. “Once they’re moving, you need to get out of the way fast.”
How Lamb Weston turned foresight into opportunity
Lamb Weston’s experience offers a real-world blueprint for how to move from reactive behavior to proactive resilience.
During the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, the company faced major uncertainty around demand, logistics, and regulatory response. Rather than waiting for clarity, Lamb Weston used a structured foresight approach:
- Monitoring policy data (e.g., Johns Hopkins dashboard) to predict restaurant closures and reopenings.
- Building scenario trees to prepare for various levels of disruption.
- Running impact assessments across the full value chain, from farmer to consumer.
- Identifying early signals of customer behavior and supplier constraints.
These strategies allowed Lamb Weston to adapt faster and with greater confidence than competitors.
“We call it the window of opportunity… it allows you to act not only with the right action, but at the right time,” said Shaun Wilken.
The success was not in avoiding disruption altogether but in building systems that transformed uncertainty into informed action. By acting early and iteratively, the company gained agility and protected continuity.
These strategies allowed Lamb Weston to adapt faster and with greater confidence than competitors.
“We call it the window of opportunity… it allows you to act not only with the right action, but at the right time,” said Shaun Wilken.
The success was not in avoiding disruption altogether but in building systems that transformed uncertainty into informed action. By acting early and iteratively, the company gained agility and protected continuity.
What makes market intelligence strategic
Market Intelligence isn’t just about reacting faster. It’s about thinking ahead. The best teams:
- Spot early signals (weather, policy, supply shifts)
- Filter noise
- Translate data into decisions
- Model multiple futures
- Know when to act—not just how
“It’s not about being 100% certain,” said Jeroen. “It’s about getting to 70% clarity, fast.”
Proactive intelligence changes everything: faster decisions, fewer surprises, and stronger positioning when change hits.
Proactive intelligence is characterized by:
- A cadence of regular updates, not one-off reports.
- Cross-functional input to align commercial, operational, and strategic goals.
- A bias toward early activation, even in ambiguity.
- Investment in external data sources, automation, and scenario-based planning.
“What usually gets spouted out… is the identification of a threat. But the below one creates something magical, which we call the window of opportunity,” said Shaun Wilken.
This proactive posture creates compound advantages. It helps avoid crises, capitalize on favorable trends early, and make change a competitive asset rather than a liability.
From Survival to Strategic Resilience
Resilience isn’t about avoiding every hit: it’s about building muscle to absorb and adapt.
That requires a shift:
- From reacting to anticipating
- From scattered signals to structured foresight
- From playing defense to spotting opportunity
“Change is hard,” said Shaun. “But with the right data, foresight, and collaboration—it’s possible.”
Resilience isn’t a trait. It’s a capability. And with the right intelligence, it can become your advantage.
