Comments on: There’s No Substitute for Inspections

By: sam

sam — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 15:56:13 +0000

I understand that Dave. I was just pointing out, perhaps lamely, one aspect of consumer protection in China. Indeed, it may well be that the lopping off a few heads will serve to distract the Chinese people from the need for any real, thoroughgoing reform.

By: Dave Schuler

Dave Schuler — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 15:49:20 +0000

sam, punishing a few miscreants won't solve China's problems, however severely. There are powerful incentives to keep doing things just the way they have been, the civil infrastructure isn't up to the task of stopping them, and the likelihood of any given nogoodnik being detected and punished are low.

By: sam

sam — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 14:52:26 +0000

The Chinese government needs to do something serious about this.

Well, the PRC Consumer Product Safety Commission is a firing squad. I expect it to be busy in the coming months.

By: Matthew Stinson

Matthew Stinson — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 14:46:23 +0000

Actually, JT, there's a strong possibility that the poison products sold in the States have been widely sold in China, it's just that consumer protection here and reporting is so weak (censored) that it takes a massive incident like the milk poisoning to actually register.

If anything, Chinese products sold outside of China are more safe than products sold inside China. For instance, some of the dairy companies in question have stated that their products sold outside of China are of a higher quality -- and thus foreigners shouldn't worry about them -- which unsurprisingly angered Chinese consumers.

By: Dave Schuler

Dave Schuler — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 14:43:42 +0000

JT: It's not as though there haven't been multiple product defect and product quality problem within China that don't make the news here. They're frequent. It isn't a case of Chinese manufacturers fobbing off shoddy stuff on foreigners. There's a more general product quality problem. Indeed, I've read frequent complaints from the Chinese complaining that the good stuff gets shipped overseas and they're left with the dreck.

By: Dave Schuler

Dave Schuler — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 14:41:02 +0000

As I understand the way the dairy system operates in China they've got hundreds of thousands of small-time producers who sell to wholesalers who in turn sell to the big-time dairy companies, just two of which have 60% of the market or more. The problem doesn't seem to have originated with the big-time dairy companies other than through a failure of quality control. It's suspected that the problem stemmed from an unknown number of unscrupulous wholesalers but it could have been through an equally unknown number of milk producers.

By: Matthew Stinson

Matthew Stinson — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 14:21:24 +0000

To expand upon your main point, the big dairy companies here in China all had the right to operate "inspection-free" for the last few years. That right has since been revoked, but it makes me wonder how many other food operations in China are considered "trusted enough" to go without inspection.

By: JT

JT — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 14:19:31 +0000

Part of the shocker about this is that these Chinese companies are causing harm to Chinese children. This is different than the toy issue which came up last year, that caused harm to American children. These companies are allowing harm to come to citizens of their own nation. The Chinese government needs to do something serious about this.