China – a “toxic liability”

This is what Finweek contributing writer, Howard Preece wrote on 23 August 2007 (Finweek).

This was after South Africa was among the countries that had suffered deaths of a number of domestic dogs caused by eating pet food containing Chinese gluten laced with melamine.

It was later confirmed that SA exports were highly harmful to humans due to grossly excessive levels of toxic cadmium in fertilizers imported from China.

The SA Manufacturing and Texture Industry also showed concerns on the poor-quality textile imports from China. According to Financial Mail (24 August 2007), “the local textile industry had scaled down dramatically in recent years and thousands of skilled workers have been laid off.”

As if that’s not enough – it is now Chinese vehicles that are starting to enter the market. Financial Mail (3 August 2007) further reported that “over 2 000 Chinese vehicles had already been sold to the local buyers” despite rumours that they have suffered from perception which afflicted products from most Asian markets for the past nine months.

As developing as South Africa is and looking at its China’s “defective and somewhat harmful” imports relationship it’s had – then to what extent will such imports have on countries like Zimbabwe given its economic situation and its relationship with China?

Could this be an indication that SA needs to look at other alternative sources?

Maybe this is something to be thought of or unless SA wants to reproduce the same kind of quality as China.