WHAT ISN’T MADE IN CHINA……….?

[Anonymous]

As health concerns mount, shoppers are asking: What isn’t made in China?
Chances are, most of your home’s furnishings, electronics, clothing and food are all thanks to China.
That’s
what I discovered when I attempted to forgo purchasing anything that
was assembled or manufactured in China – even if it included just an
ingredient from China.Concerns about buying products made in China have
mushroomed lately, with tales of contaminated dog food, toothpaste and
shrimp spooking some shoppers. Mattel yanked 1.5 million
China-manufactured toys last week after some of the toys, including
Sesame Street characters, were found to contain lead. And some Chinese
seafood, which typically accounts for 80 percent of seafood imports in
the United States, was recently barred from importation after
farm-raised eel, carp, shrimp and catfish were found to be contaminated
by antimicrobial agents.
To be fair, American products are not
immune to contamination. In July, the Food and Drug Administration
warned that some bags of Robert’s American Gourmet brand Veggie Booty
contained a strain of salmonella, and Castleberry’s Food Co. shut down
a Georgia production facility after several cans of its chili sauce
were contaminated with botulism-causing bacteria.But China’s products
are still swiping the spotlight, thanks to negative public perception,
patriotism and concerns over unfair labor practices. Of the more than
330 products that have been recalled this year, 60 percent of them were
manufactured in China, according to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety
Commission.China has received a lot of scrutiny and criticism for its
massive influx of exports to the United States, said Mark Vitner, a
senior economist with Wachovia.”The reason why it’s so disconcerting to
a lot of folks is the sheer magnitude of products and the growing
reliance on China for raw goods and key components,” he said. “There is
also a great deal of state control of their economy, and some regard
China somewhat suspiciously. There are a lot of concerns that have some
validity to them.”
But avoiding China-manufactured goods can be a
daunting task, as the sheer ubiquity of China-manufactured goods is
staggering: China exports make up 40 percent of all consumer goods
imported to the United States, according to the U.S. Consumer Product
Safety Commission. That magnitude of imports may leave domestic
manufacturers and farmers feeling the squeeze, Vitner said.”There are
always going to be winners and losers from free trade,” he said. “But
we have a great deal more purchasing power because of international
trade when we spend less of our money on clothing and televisions, we
have more to spend on travel and leisure.”A glimpse in a kitchen
cabinet alone usually yields several items from China – and some
products may surprise you. For example, 50 percent of U.S. apple juice
is from China.The allure of Chinese labor? It’s simply more
cost-effective: On average, wages are lower, translating to lower
prices overall, according to Vitner.The same notion holds true for Dale
Christenson, founder of the Surf Source, an Atlantic Beach company that
sells surfboard materials to manufacturers and surf shops. Several
molded items, such as surfboard fins, are manufactured in China.”I’ve
found it to be pretty lucrative to source things abroad,” he said. “But
there are some caution flags that go up when doing so, mostly matching
the quality that you require. That’s one of the biggest hurdles, since
there’s a language barrier and there can be a difference in business
ethics.”Christenson says the outsourcing means a hefty savings over
domestic manufacturers (more than 50 percent), and that looking to
China is essential to keep prices competitive.”It helps us maintain our
prices without having to increase them,” he said. “By counteracting
inflation, we can maintain our pricing structure.”

What are the alternatives
With
such an influx of affordable manufacturing, how difficult would it be
to swap out China-made products and switch entirely to items made
elsewhere? Turns out, avoiding China-manufactured products – and
sticking to it – isn’t easy, or cheap. We did it for a week and broke
it down to show how wide-sweeping China’s reach is:TOOLSIt was nearly
impossible to find any hammers, nails, screwdrivers or much of anything
else in the hardware sections that wasn’t made in China. Light bulbs,
gloves and the like were also made in China. According to the
Department of Commerce’s International Trade Administration, $2 billion
worth of tools (a figure that includes cutlery) were imported from
China in 2006.

CLOTHINGThis may be one of the easiest categories
in which to avoid China-made items. At Wal-Mart, the available
clothing’s tags were a veritable cornucopia of countries: Indonesia,
Lesotho, Jordan, Bangladesh. But there was a wide swath of China-made
garments: a $9.77 Henley sweater, $15.92 jeans, and men’s boxers dotted
with metallic dragons. Meanwhile, those looking for shoes made
elsewhere are in for a long hunt. From sneakers to high-heeled wedges
and sandals, nearly every pair was made in China. The same goes for
pairs at Target and Payless Shoe Source. Looking for American shoes?
Prepare to spend a lot more. Mukluks, a brand of leather boots made in
Minnesota, go for $250, for example.

TECHNOLOGYCustomers would
be hard pressed to find technology not made in China. At one local
Wal-Mart location, every stereo, remote control, air filter and
calculator came from China. One ink jet’s label said it was
“re-manufactured” in China. In fact, of all of China’s U.S. exports,
technology and electronics were the biggest piece of the pie, totaling
22.6 percent ($287 billion’s worth) of all of U.S. imports from China,
according to research from the U.S. Department of Commerce’s
International Trade Administration. Coffee makers, waffle irons and
sandwich presses were all made in China at the discount retailers
spot-checked by the Times-Union. For those willing to splurge, you can
find espresso machines and the like from Australia and France – but
they can cost much more. A Wal-Mart coffee maker from China can fetch
anywhere from $20 to $109. But at Williams-Sonoma, coffee makers made
in other countries can go for nearly $300.

HOME FURNISHINGSThis
particular segment can be tricky. Many times, a build-it-yourself shelf
will have American wood, but screws and the like made in China. Look
carefully at the box – but be warned that some of the pieces (handles,
etc) will be labeled as China-made on the plastic bags hidden inside
the box. Other items, such as faux houseplants, include leaves and
plastic stems that were manufactured in China, but were assembled in a
U.S. factory.

GROCERIESUnlike with computers, furniture and
clothing, it can be much trickier to unearth the origin of food. While
the government ruled in 2002 that every food item’s country of origin
should be clearly labeled, the law’s implementation has been postponed
due to a Congressional motion, said Steve Cohen, a spokesman for the
United States Department of Agriculture.In that case, finding out where
your food comes from will take some digging, but here are the basics:
Roughly one-third of food imports are from China, and less than 1
percent of that is inspected, according to the USDA.I had to do some
squinty-eyes reading of labels to figure out where much of my grocery
list came from. Produce at Publix was easy enough, as most of the
fruits and vegetables have stickers pointing out their birthplaces.
(Plums hail from Peru, avocados from Guatemala.)Seafood was similarly
simple: Just look at the price signs posted, and the name of the
country is toward the bottom. Winn-Dixie was one of the retailers who
purchased seafood from Chinese manufacturers, but Robin Miller recently
insisted in an e-mail that their supply was not affected.However, the
origins of a box of Visine at Publix remained ambiguous. The box listed
only the distributor’s location (Pfizer in New Jersey), but not the
origin of the ingredients. I tried to call companies – such as General
Mills – to ask, but most would not divulge where their products were
made, citing the knowledge as “proprietary.”Online, I scoured for Web
sites dedicated to American products. One, http://www.BuyAmerican.com, seemed
promising, but the items were not so useful. Why would I ever need a
$10 jar of mesquite bean jelly?

TOYSSeventy percent of toys
imported to the United States come from China – and every toy that has
been recalled thus far this year has been manufactured there. A
now-notorious line of toy trains that were coated in lead paint were
recently yanked off shelves, for example. Even so, it doesn’t seem as
though the number of China-made toys will decrease anytime soon. In
2001, China toy imports were valued at $12 billion. In 2006, that
number shot to $20 billion. Indeed, these toys are fairly ubiquitous,
from Playmobil figurines to Barbie dolls. (Legos, however, are made in
Europe.) 

[Author]

August 8, 2007 at 11:35 AM