Around 4,000 JCB and agency shop floor employees have been working a 34-hour week for the past fortnight due to anticipated component shortages from Chinese suppliers impacted by the coronavirus outbreak.

Last month JCB warned that more than 25% of its suppliers in China had closed in the face of the Coronavirus outbreak.

From this week, all factories are reverting to a basic working week of 39 hours.

JCB chief executive officer Graeme Macdonald said: “This is not a moment for celebration, but it is a step in the right direction.

“There has been some improvement in the shipment of components from China but new threats are emerging from our supply chain in other parts of the world, notably Italy and South Korea.

“We will continue to monitor the situation very closely on a daily basis and take any necessary measures to protect the business.”

The resumption of supplies comes as many of the industry’s plant hirers were warning supplies of spares were running low.

Some stocks had dwindled to just a few weeks although the industry had not yet been hit by plant outages because of lack of spares.