Tainted toys

Mattel continues to recall toys covered in paint with excessive lead levels and toys including small magnets that could pose a health hazard if ingested by children. By now, the large majority of toys are manufactured in China. The scandal gives the “Made in China” label a bad reputation. China correctly counters that more than 98% of export products meet international quality standards. But that doesn't make it right for 2% to be possibly lethally dangerous.

Toy manufacturers are blamed, but most of them have not knowingly used substandard materials. Zhang Shuhong, CEO of toy maker Lee Der Industrial in Foshan, committed suicide. His best friend had supplied him with the lead paint. Apparently unknowingly, because another factory had supplied lead ingredients which were mixed in the paint.

The bottom line is, Chinese factories' incoming inspection is weak to non-existent. Deals are made among friends, business partners gathered around the banquet table, toasting gan beis to merrily clinched deals. Nobody checks the quality of whatever is entering the factory gates. Used and mixed, when it leaves the gates, the managers are ignorant about what's in it. Exported it enters the labs of Mattel, where from now on everything coming out of China will be scrutinized endlessly.

To avoid tragedies – and loss of business – Chinese companies should set up incoming inspection departments, where they themselves can scrutinize what suppliers drop at the gates. Yes, it will add to the costs, but setting up a well-staffed lab will no doubt be much cheaper than the lost business as a result of exports bans that are now making up the headlines.

Oh, and before once again picking on the Chinese, it would be appropriate to remember that most of the companies vilified for exporting dangerous products do have capital if not managers from Hong Kong, Taiwan or abroad. They want to cut corners to make profits. Of course, Hong Kong and Taiwan are also part of China, but if bosses from those two territories are to blame, it should be duly pointed out, instead of blaming "the Chinese".

Anyway, the lead-and-magnets problem is a wake-up call for the Chinese government. Wild and unbridled capitalism leads to wild and unbridled problems. Abolishing capitalism is the best solution, but if that is a bridge too far for now, at least the government could reign-in its most abhorrent excesses.