CNN's Jack Cafferty saying China's goods 'junk'... - What's your say on this?

[Nazreen]

Fresh protests broke out accross China yesterday demanding for CNN's commentator Jack cafferty's sacking for calling China's goods 'junk' and it's leaders a 'bunch of goons and thugs.

Personally, I don't think that China's goods can be called 'junk'. Take Nike, Reebok or Adidas for example, the quality of these items are very good and if you take a look at the tag on the collar, it says "Made in China". Maybe some of the goods from China aren't that good especially if it's a brand that you've never heard before. There are also a lot of fake items coming from China but you'll be able to spot these immediately because of their poor quality. Speaking of fakes, why hasn't anyone complained of fake Rolex watches? Fake Rolex watches didn't originate from China...

Calling China's leaders a 'bunch of goons and thugs' might be a bit true. According to Transparency International (The global coalition against corruption), CPI (Corruption Perception Index) for China is 3.5 which is quite low. Some of the major emerging markets like India, Brazil and Romania also have CPI of 3.5. Out of the 179 nations in the survey, China is not even in the top 100 when in comes to corruption.

See http://www.transparency.org/policy_research/surveys_indices/cpi/2007.


Explanatory notes*
* CPI Score relates to perceptions of the degree of corruption as seen by business people and country analysts, and ranges between 10 (highly clean) and 0 (highly corrupt).

What's your take on this?

[Fergal]

I know some local Irish businesses who are very successfully importing and selling goods from China. They are doing it over the long term and making repeat sales, so the quality of the goods is not an issue.

Like anywhere else you need to be careful if you are purchasing goods from China. You need to have your own quality systems and procedures in place to help ensure that you only buy goods of a high quality. If you just rush in and buy the lowest cost goods on offer from China, you can't expect to get good quality, but this is the same regardless which country you purchase from.

Although, you probably do need to be a bit more cautious when you are buying from a low cost economy that is thousands of miles away from you and where the seller may not be as protective of their reputation as your local suppliers would be.

To classify all goods from a particular country as being "junk" is very short-sighted and narrow minded.

[pendelton]

I worked for a place a long time ago that imported stainless steel parts for boats and the quality was alright, the only problem is knowing that when you need English measurements you have to be explicit. A 3mm hex nut is not the same as a .125 inch hex nut, although they are close.

There are companies that you can hire to do the ground work for you, going to the factories and showing them exactly what you want, a guy I know travels all over Asia doing just that. Has his main home in Thailand and travels all over.

The more proactive Asian companies have offices in the major cities, the one I dealt with has an office in the Chicago area that I visited, plus LA, New York, and one in the southern US I can not remember.

This also brings to mind the old adage, You get what you pay for.

[Nazreen]

Yes, that's true. More often than not, you get what you pay for. But this is not always the case so that's why major corporations and companies switch or look to other countries and export products or even services (in the form of out-sourcing). Take India for example, a lot of banks and companies out-source their IT support and also development to this nation. As for China, major brands like Nike, Reebok and others also have their manufacturing factories there. This is because they want to cut costs. Especially with rising inflation rates, companies are looking for ways to save money and going for China and other emerging markets is their best bet in achieving this. The quality might not be that good at first but if they send over their professional quality assurance staffs to monitor and train, qualities of products and services have no way to go but up.

[gloryplastic]

China goods is not bad, can acceptable...