WASHINGTON (Reuters), – A survey by the U.S. Commerce Department of both semiconductor chip producers and consumers showed Tuesday that a severe shortage is likely, primarily due to wafer manufacturing capacity.

In a statement, the department stated that it was “involved in problem-solving by industry for node-specific problems” over the next few weeks. Also, we will investigate claims of unusually high nodes prices.

“Demand is high for chips. “It is increasing,” Gina Raimondo, Commerce Secretary, told reporters. She added that demand for chips is currently about 20% higher than 2019 levels. She said that there isn’t much good news in the survey.

Last fall, a voluntary survey among 150 businesses in the supply chain revealed “there is an important, persistent mismatch of supply and demand. Respondents didn’t see this problem changing in the next six month.”

According to the department, key chip consumers have a lower median inventory of key chips than they did in 2019, which was 40 days. It will be less than five days by 2021.