"Prejudice is farther from the truth than ignorance," as a Western saying goes. For years, some Westerners often refer to China-made products as "too cheap," which flooded their markets and were repeatedly subjected to "anti-dumping" probes launched against them.
They assert that these cheap Chinese products should be held accountable for the rising rate of unemployment in a couple of trades in the Western world. Some "humanitarians", who seem concerned with the Chinese much more than the people in China themselves, however, have reproached Chinese factories for their wretched working conditions with no "human rights" to speak of there.
Before this sort of voice quiets down, another kind of voice resounds. In recent months, some Westerners slammed the prices of Chinese commodities as "too costly"nevertheless, and so Chinese goods have add more inflation pressures to them. An article in a Western newspaper has gone too far as to be banner headlined as "Inflation represents Beijing's very export item with the fastest growth rate".
This has indeed made people ill at ease. This or that, neither is good. When they look at people through their colored spectacles, nothing seems proper and suitable. Then, how about the whole truth?
For the past three-plus decades, Western developed nations have held core technologies and patents tight to themselves on one hand and, on the other hand, they have shifted their production processes to developing countries, which are known for the cheap labor productivity, easy accesses to the supply of raw materials and low production costs. Consequently, they made huge profits while alleviating pressure for price rise in the West. As the British Sunday Telegraph said in an article of September 9, China has played a vital, crucial role in helping the West to recover from dual assaults from the ruin of web economy and "9/11 attacks since 2001.
The Western world has gained so many advantages, and what benefits has China reaped itself? It should be acknowledged that the economic globalization is good for China on the whole, and that the hefty rise of its economy over the last two decades and more has been attributable to this. People should never forget that it is not the charity bestowed by the West but the fruit reaped by Chinese people through their hard, arduous effort paid with their own sweat and blood.
Western distributors, in a bid to maximize their profits, have done their utmost to cut he costs, and the human labor cost in particular. While shopping cheap goods originated from China in Wal-Mart supermarkets, some people complained of poor working conditions in Chinese factories and quality problems of their production materials, etc. They indeed pretend to behave graciously after obtaining some pretty gains.
Prices of a few Chinese export commodities have been up to some extent in recent months owing to a steady rise in global oil prices, in the cost of law materials and in the environment protection spending plus an appropriate rise in the salaries of workers. Isn't this matter a normal issue?
What is really intriguing and worth mulling over is that the United States has gone on exerting pressures upon China for revaluating Renminbi (RMB), and it seems that only through the appreciation of RMB, can the U.S.' economic problem be resolved. As a matter of fact, RMB has so far increased its value by close to 10 percent, and some Westerners have already come to see that things are not going in the right way. With the appreciation of RMB, they note, the prices of Chinese goods in American supermarkets are sure to rise. The appreciation (of RMB) will oblige China's benign impact on global prices to terminate more rapidly, according to an ace British economist in his recent article.
Sometimes, some Western viewpoints are rather despotic and overbearing, as they assert they are always right in whatever they say, and they often find faults with whatever others are doing. Nevertheless, people in China have got used to it. The Associated Press has dispatched an interesting story recently. The news story says that Nebraska State Senator Emie Chambers, who had the longest tenure of office in his state, sued God over natural disaster, saying in his lawsuit that "God has terrorist threats against the senator and his constituents".
Since a lawsuit can be filed against God in whom people under heaven trust most, so one should not get alarmed or confused at irresponsible remarks hurled against the Chinese. People in China are convinced of the vivid ancient poetic line that "as distance tests a horse's strength, time reveals a person's heart." What kind of products are the commodities turned out in China, and are people in the country capable merely of making low-end products and selling their own labor force? For this question, people both at home and overseas are now awaiting its answer!
By Zhan Dexiong, a research fellow of the Research Center on International Issues, and translated by People's Daily Online
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