I bought the book a few weeks ago, Cradle to Cradle, and because of lack of time I started reading today and while reading the first chapter suddenly thought of the news I read a few months a go on the Dutch news website I daily look up. There was a story about products from China who were send back due to high concentrates of lead, formaldehyde, dychloorethane and benzene. Dutch companies refused to accept dolls, mattresses, clothes, baby stuff and jewellery.Big producer of toys like Barbie has recalled a lot of products due to high lead concentrates. There are lots of Blogs (and another) with titles as 'China is murdering us, starting with our children". Mainly from the USA, but it's a worldwide fenomen. China has a high demand on production and a shortness of materials combine this with lack of quality control and you get yourself a 'nice' harmfull product. Substandard Chinese products have been found in a number of countries, and Beijing is having to defend Chinese-manufactured exports. Unsafe goods have implications not only for foreign trade and international relations, but also within the domestic market. "A good system for guaranteeing quality control simply doesn't exist in China," says Wang, who has spent more than 10 years trying to clean up the Chinese marketplace.
Even Wikipedia has an overview of recalls from China 2007 stored in their system...
China Manufacturing Demand???
ReplyDeleteSure sure sure, China is manufacturing poor quality products using poor energy source and poor materials. Do you honestly think that China will not rise to the challenge and go green? China is in a major transitional faze. They will lead the world in green technology ect in years to come. Everyone uses China as the global whipping boy, wake up, don't you remember Japan being in the same position 20 years ago and several other counties before Japan. Have you ever spent time in the factories in China? Have you ever been to China?
Dear anonymous
ReplyDeleteYes, I've been to China a couple of times in the late nineties, early 2000, we dealt with Chinese manufacturers a lot so I know a bit about it, having friends in several cities of China.
And I know China is also working very hard on a 'green world' as you could have seen on one of my previous entries:
http://o2wa.blogspot.com/2007/07/china-from-red-to-green.html
When there is happening a lot, there is also space for more trouble, don't know how to translate the Dutch saying better..
There are still a lot of things happening in the world which need to be improved, and I am very sorry that I have hurt your feelings by this blog.
But as you are anonymous I can't tell it to you in person...