Editorial

Citation

Bennett, D. (2006), "Editorial", Journal of Manufacturing Technology Management, Vol. 17 No. 7. https://doi.org/10.1108/jmtm.2006.06817gaa.001

Editorial

A few weeks ago, I paid a visit to China; spending some time in the cities of Beijing and Tianjin. Although I visited China at least once each year between 1990 and 2000 this recent visit was the first I had made for six years. Therefore, I was keen to see what had changed and I was impressed in many ways. On the negative side there is clearly a problem with environmental pollution due to the rapid pace of industrial development (a tenfold increase in GDP since 1978). Beijing’s vehicles produce 3,600 tons of pollutants each day and the city is falling well behind its target of 238 “blue sky” days this year. This is obviously something that must be addressed if China really wants to join the club of industrialised countries. On the other hand, China’s progress in manufacturing is truly remarkable. No more is this evident than from the cars on the roads. When I first visited China there was a wide array of vehicles from Japanese imports to cars of local origin that seemed to have originated from backstreet workshops. However, now there are numerous international models coming out of joint-venture factories set-up by Volkswagen/Audi, General Motors, Toyota, Honda, Mazda, Citroen, Hyundai, etc. But more striking is the number of vehicles coming from wholly Chinese companies such as Geely Automotive and Chery. They may lag some way behind the joint-venture manufacturers in terms of style and quality, but they are catching up fast and will undoubtedly soon be a powerful competitive force (although Chery is currently being sued by GM for patent infringement and several foreign manufacturers are in IPR disputes with other Chinese manufacturers). Moreover, it is not just in consumer goods that China is making advances. From my discussions with foreign representatives in the industrial goods sector, such as machine tools, it is evident that Chinese manufacturers are now proving to be strong competitors to Western companies, especially for standard “off-the-shelf” machines.

Of course, the more advanced industrialised countries of the West and East Asia can stay ahead of the Chinese competition through their efforts in research and development. However, it is the other, smaller, developing countries that stand to lose out in the competition to join the World’s industrial nations. The rules of the WTO (World Trade Organisation) now make it very difficult for them to provide protection and support to their industries in the same way that that the newly industrialising countries could rely on their industry ministries to provide help during the 1970s and 1980s through the imposition of import tariffs, local content rules, etc. Between 1980 and 2002 African GDP per capita contracted at an average annual rate of 0.47 percent, which is in stark contrast to the growth of China’s economy. There is much talk about giving aid to Africa, but to close the gap in industrial output must require a dramatic change in policy towards these developing countries, otherwise they are destined to remain the losers in the global industrial race.

David Bennett