Influx

Almost overnight, Chinese goods have crept into our lives, so much so, we’ve become dependent on them.

It’s likely consumers used to believe big brands who manufacture in China and those retailers importing from China, operated some kind of quality checks. We also probably never thought of China as a place that manufacturers our food and health products.

However, the recent pet food contamination highlights the deficiency in safety control that exist in the system. The pet food problem impacted major brands and was responsible for killing as many as 4,000 American pets.

Then last week, there was another scandal, with the news about Chinese slaves. Although they were not directly involved in manufacturing goods for Western consumption, the news is forcing people to look at the working conditions in China once again.

The pet food issue is forcing China to take food safety seriously, but it’s a large country with millions of manufacturing centers, it’s going to be tough to control. The safety issue already seems to have gone beyond per food with other Asian countries having problems from tainted Chinese food destined for human consumption.

On the issue of working conditions, most US companies already audit their suppliers, but the deficiencies in these audits have been exposed by Business Week.

The recent slavery issue is likely to ignite the efforts of various Western NGOS who want governments to put more pressure on China to improve labor rights. They are likely to be stepping-up their efforts prior to the Beijing Olympics.

Obviously, the safety of food, health and beauty products is of prime importance to consumers. This month, a poll conducted by Harris found 86% of consumers were somewhat and seriously concerned about product recalls.

Influx believes consumers will now spend more time checking the source of the food and health products and will expect retailers and brands to be doing the same.

For industry, there’s no alternative, China has become the world’s factory.

All it can do is bring in its own safety checks and hope the Chinese government does the same.

Posted by Ed Cotton