Doing business in China: August 2007 Archives
By REUTERS | The New York Times
August 30, 2007
Toys "R" Us Inc is recalling 27,000 wooden coloring cases that were made in China and sold under its Imaginarium brand because lead was found in the printed ink on the art set's outer packaging and in some watercolor paints.
The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, which announced the recall on Thursday, said the 213-piece coloring set includes crayons, pastels, colored pencils and water colors that were packaged in a light tan wooden carrying case.
The printed ink on the outer packaging of the case contains lead, and some of the black watercolor paint contains excessive levels of lead, the agency said.
The cases were sold at the toy retailer's stores and on its Web site from October 2006 through August 2007 for about $20. Of the 27,000 cases that were recalled, Toys "R" Us said 8,300 were sold to customers during the recall period.
It marks the latest in a string of recalls of Chinese-made products due to lead paint, including Mattel Inc's recent recall of Pixar Sarge die-cast toy cars, and Sesame Street and Dora the Explorer toys.
Lead paint has been linked to health problems in children, including brain damage.
By RTTNews | nasdaq.com
August 23, 2007
A prominent California Republican congressman is helping to spearhead GOP efforts to urge President Bush to boycott the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing amid concerns that China has not improved its often-criticized human rights record.
Introduced by Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, R-Calif., the nonbinding resolution calls for the U.S. government to take "immediate steps" to boycott the games unless the "Chinese regime stops engaging in serious human rights abuses against its citizens and stops supporting serious human rights abuses by the governments of Sudan, Burma and North Korea against their citizens."
Rohrabacher, a member of the House Committee on International Relations, said the Olympic Games represent the "noblest elements of humanity," while the communist Chinese government "represents the opposite."
"The Olympic torch is supposed to be a beacon of light shining upon mankind's higher aspirations in the world, and it's a travesty to have that torch hosted by a regime that is the world's worst human rights abuser," he said.
The resolution is co-sponsored by House Republicans Joseph Pitts of Pennsylvania, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Florida, Thaddeus McCotter of Michigan, John Doolittle of California, Dan Burton of Indiana, Frank Wolf of Virginia and Christopher Smith of New Jersey.
Rohrabacher said just as the United States turned a blind eye to Germany's Nazi regime by participating in the 1936 summer games in Berlin, the U.S. participating in the 2008 games would ignore China's ties to the Sudanese government, which has been complicit in the genocide in the Darfur region.
By Rachel Beck | The Charlotte Observer
August 18, 2007
The first Barbie dolls to hit the market in 1959 cost $3 each. Today, the fashion doll won't set you back much more than that. That's the economics of the toy business. Consumers demand low prices. Toymakers want fat profits. So manufacturing ambled off to China, which for a long time has been willing and able to please both.
Now a massive toy recall by Mattel Inc. reveals an ugly side to that cost-cutting drive. The sacrifice of safety just to provide cheap toys is something for which everyone will have to pay.
The slogan "Made in China" has long stood for affordability. Thanks to the dramatically lower labor costs that China offered -- estimated by some to be a fifth of what they are globally -- toymakers could knock down their expenses by shifting production abroad.
That has boosted corporate earnings and helped them gain shelf space in retail chains such as Wal-Mart Stores Inc. that insisted on low prices for the products they bought. The merchants could then offer good deals to price-conscious shoppers, without losing any profits.
The result is an industry that hasn't seen its products' prices soar much. The prices of many toys today, when adjusted for inflation, may be less expensive than those decades ago, even though such things as raw material costs -- like paper and plastic -- have skyrocketed, according to independent toy industry consultant Chris Byrne.
"We can't have ever-decreasing prices without something eventually being squeezed," Byrne said.
That squeeze is what has been grabbing headlines lately.
As millions of China-made toys have been recalled, suddenly Americans have become very aware -- and scared -- of the risks of manufacturing there.
By Louise Story and David Barboza | The New York Times
August 15, 2007
Mattel, the world's largest toy company, yesterday announced the biggest recall in its history.
In a double-barreled announcement, the company said it was recalling 436,000 Chinese-made die-cast toy cars depicting the character Sarge from the animated film "Cars" because they are covered with lead paint.
At the same time, the toy maker said it was recalling 18.2 million other toys because their small, powerful magnets could harm children if swallowed. The magnetized toys were also made in China, but they followed a Mattel design specification.
About half of the toys in each recall were distributed in the United States.
Amid a wave of increasing safety concerns about products made in China, the recall threatened to set the toy industry on its heels -- just as companies are beginning to ship toys to stores for the holiday shopping season, when half of all toy purchases are made.
Separately, laboratory tests have found that some Chinese-made vinyl baby bibs sold at Toys "R" Us stores appear to be contaminated with lead.
Industry analysts said Mattel's woes are part of a much larger problem.
"If I went down the shelves of Wal-Mart and tested everything, I'm going to find serious problems," said Sean McGowan, managing director and the toy analyst at Wedbush Morgan Securities. "The idea that Mattel -- with its high standards -- has a bigger problem than everybody else is laughable. If we don't see an increase of recalls in this industry, then it's a case of denial."
Even Mattel executives said repeatedly yesterday that the company may have more recalls.
By Natasha Metzler | The Associated Press | via (uncensored) Yahoo! News
August 14, 2007
Toy-making giant Mattel Inc. issued recalls Tuesday for about 9 million Chinese-made toys that contain magnets children can swallow or which could have lead paint.
The recall includes 7.3 million play sets, including Polly Pocket dolls and Batman action figures, and 253,000 die cast cars that contain lead paint.
Nancy A. Nord, acting Consumer Product Safety Commission chairman, told a news conference no injuries had been reported with any of the products involved in the new recall.
"The scope of these recalls is intentionally large to prevent any injuries from occurring," she told the news conference.
At least one U.S. child has died and 19 others have needed surgery since 2003 after swallowing magnets used in toys, the government said. Several injuries had been reported in an earlier Polly Pocket recall last November.
Mattel, in a full-page ad Tuesday in some U.S. newspapers, said the company was "one of the most trusted names with parents" and was "working extremely hard to address your concerns and continue creating safe, entertaining toys for you and your children."
Tuesday's recall was the latest blow to the toy industry, which has had a string of recalled products from China. With about 80 percent of toys sold worldwide made in China, toy sellers are worried shoppers will shy away from their products.
It was also the second recall involving lead paint for Mattel in two weeks. Earlier this month, consumers were warned about 1.5 million Chinese-made toys that contain lead paint.
"There is no excuse for lead to be found in toys entering this country," Nord said. "It's totally unacceptable and it needs to stop."
By Chris Buckley | REUTERS | via (uncensored) yahoo!news
August 3, 2007
Parents around the world may have been shocked this week when 1.5 million Chinese-made Fisher-Price toys were recalled because of excessive lead content, but for mums and dads in China lead poisoning is just a fact of life.
Mattel Inc.'s worldwide recall of dozens of products is the latest in a deluge of safety scares that have rattled international consumer confidence in Chinese-made goods.
High levels of lead from toys, water pipes and industry can cause behavioral problems and slow learning among children.
But if Beijing was worried about Chinese children being affected, that was not reflected in state-run media on Friday, which were silent about Mattel's recall.
And it was business as usual in the toy section of Beijing's Tianyi department store.
"I do not worry so much, if the toy looks fun for my child, it is okay. My child is already so big, he is not going to put the toy in his mouth," said a Mrs. Zhang, who was buying toys for her four-year-old son.
Indeed, for many parents, lead competes with many other toxins in the heavily polluted country as a source of anxiety.
"There are just too many things to worry about," said Li Huijing, mother of a five-year-old girl. "There are some things I just try not to think about. I try to pay more for good toys."
HOUSE PAINT, OLD PIPES
China has responded to rising consumer expectations by setting stricter standards for lead in toys, most recently introducing new labeling rules. But imposing those standards on the country's vast and fragmented toy sector is difficult.
China makes 75 percent of the world's toys, according to the national chamber of light industry, and many of the thousands of producers are small and resistant to regulation.
They make cheap plastic, metal and wooden toys that -- if regular news reports are a guide -- often have a lead content well above government-set limits.
A 2005 report in a Beijing newspaper cited estimates that 60 percent of Chinese-made toys used paint with lead above internationally accepted limits.
The China Toy Association would not answer questions about the problem.
By Mindy Fetterman, Greg Farrell and Laura Petrecca | USA Today
August 3, 2007
First it was Thomas the Tank Engine trains. Then Easy-Bake Ovens. And now Big Bird, Elmo, Cookie Monster and Dora the Explorer.
All are beloved children's characters that were licensed to toy manufacturers who contracted with companies in China to make the toys. And all have had those toys recalled. Millions of them. Just since June.
The latest is Mattel (MAT), which announced Thursday that it was recalling 1.5 million toys made in China for the company's Fisher-Price division.
Those toys feature the Sesame Street characters — the big yellow one; the little red one; the hairy blue one — and Nickelodeon's adventuresome bilingual cartoon girl.
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