Say no thanks to imports

I was seconded earlier today to put up a Chrimbo tree. It came in a long cardboard box and was purchased from Argos. I took out the pieces and looked for the instructions, which were printed on a single sided piece of paper. In the corner of this paper it said those ubiquitous words "Made in China" and with them came dissolution. We have to to the point in the UK where it is easier and cheaper to make and import artificial Chrimbo trees from China rather than to make them here. What a sorry state of affairs I thought. I then began to assemble the parts, it didn't take too long, but as I spread the twigs apart on the branches I began to feel some kind of chemical or plastic like residual on my hands. In addition I really think the design of tree probably would not of passed British safety standards. It was poorly constructed and will likely get thrown away after Chrimbo than saved for the next year. So the carbon used to deliver it to the UK, the life use of the product and it's suspect design means it's nothing to be proud of. In an odd irony this is the prime example of a product which will help destroy the world, i.e. global warming.

There is now little choice in the UK to purchase goods made in the UK, made to British standards and by people living here. Just a walk into any super store will validate this point. The plethora of goods which come out of China are disconcerting. They have cheap labour and dire employee rights. It is from developing countries the Western world now resources the production of many goods of which India can now identify itself. They are moving from the production of poor quality goods into high end services. Another example of this would be caller centres. How annoying it is when ringing up a bank or British Telecom for example and finding you are speaking to someone who doesn't understand what you mean. OK I seen the programs on TV where they train these call centre employees to learn about the British common culture, as though this gives them some insight and ability to deal with queries on the phone. But this is ridiculous, it is like having a brand new graduate come into a company get fast streamed into management and then have the graduate tell lower graded employees how to do their job. You have to live here, and be part of this culture to really understand it. Let alone even consider comprehending regional accents. I know of one Scottish person who has always failed to get a point across to a contact centre based in a developing country. They just plainly can not understand a strong Scottish accent.

In a similar vein I heard on the radio this morning about Afghanistan. Where a flood of cash is being put from the UN. However, this money is not going to indigenous peoples. It is going to foreign workers who set up shop there and bid for contracts. It is equally a sorry state of affairs to believe the Afghan people do not have the abilities and skills to run their own businesses. But then this could all be down to politics. Maybe the people of Afghanistan should start doing caller centres for India and China. What have they got to lose?