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China Daily E-paper
Qiao Xinsheng
A 30-second justification spot
By Qiao Xinsheng (China Daily)
Updated: 2009-12-24 07:48
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As part of a global campaign to improve overseas opinions on Chinese-made products, a 30-second advertisement aimed at promoting the "Made in China" brand made its debut on the Cable News Network (CNN) on Nov 23, 2009.
The government-sponsored television ad - showing a fashion model working a camera, an executive awaiting the takeoff of his flight, a family sitting down to breakfast -aims to remind viewers that many commodities closely related with daily life are made in China.
The 30-second spot, due to run six weeks on the popular US broadcaster, shows audiences that the running shoes they don for a morning run are made in China with US technology, that their iPods and MP3 players are made in China with technology from Silicon Valley, and that their French-designed clothes are made in China. The ad ends with a US-accented voice proclaiming "When it says Made in China, it really means Made in China, Made with the world."
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The Chinese government had planned to make such a move as early as last year, but the plan was postponed due to the poisoned milk powder scandal in mid-last year. The emerging protectionism against Chinese products amid the world economic slowdown has made the Chinese government realize the importance and urgency of launching a global campaign to promote its national image.
In recent years, as the scale of the Chinese economy continues to expand, the "China Threat" fallacy has once again gained ground in some foreign countries. It is known that the export of Chinese products to foreign countries has not only provided local residents with assorted articles to choose, but has also lowered their living costs. Nevertheless, the large-scale inflow of usable and reasonably priced Chinese commodities has also offered excuses for some Western countries to trumpet the "China Threat" tone. Some Western media claim that China's low-priced goods have sabotaged the world's established trade order and led to some job losses in their countries. As a result, all-out efforts have been made to trumpet anti-dumping and anti-subsidy investigations on Chinese products. Also, out of the need for domestic politics, some Western countries, under the excuse of so-called anti-subsidization, have continuously levied punitive high duties on Chinese products.
Since the outbreak of the world financial crisis, many Western countries have brandished the protectionist stick to shift complicated domestic contradictions and thus chosen to exert pressures on an export-dependent China. As a result, China's exports have been under an increasingly harsh external environment. In the face of the anti-dumping and anti-subsidization offensive launched by some Western countries, a number of Chinese enterprises had to give up their Western market shares due to the lack of ability to deal with the situation. Some have chosen to move their manufacturing bases abroad to evade China-targeted trade barriers. However, in the context of an increasingly fierce protectionism, the prospect of their overseas business still remains extremely gloomy.
Under these circumstances, the "Made in China" promotion, sponsored by the Ministry of Commerce, serves as a much-needed action to re-forge the image of Chinese enterprises and products. It is by no means a TV ad purely aimed at promoting Chinese-made products. With a deliberately designed TV effect, the spot mainly aims to tell overseas audiences that Chinese products are essentially a merger between Western technology, idea and styles with Chinese craftsmanship and that the "Made in China" brand is the concept of international cooperation.
The well-conceived ad is expected to help eradicate negative opinions among foreign consumers toward Chinese-made products and greatly elevate the image of the "Made in China" brand. The boom of China's manufacturing sector is not achieved at the sacrifice of environment quality and labor exploitation. Instead, it aims to manufacture valuable articles for world consumers under the driving of advanced world's technologies.
Different from the marketing ads by domestic enterprises, which mainly focus on their price and quality advantage, the latest government-sponsored TV ad aims to boost the image of the "Made in China" brand and stress cooperation between Chinese enterprises with foreign counterparts. It reflects the Chinese government's growing eagerness to make the world realize that Chinese products have merged themselves with the world's advanced technologies and gears its aspiration to convert domestic manufacturing into a global cooperation. The ad is also expected to help deepen people's recognition of globalization and disperse the West-advocated "China Threat" fallacy.
As the world's manufacturing center, China has not only manufactured cheap but good-quality products, but has also successfully developed itself into a world center of technological merger. All steps of the "Made in China" brand, including its designing, technological research and marketing, have converged Chinese people's deep friendship towards the world citizen and their wishes to integrate with the world's material civilization and civil enhancement achievement into an organic entity.
Highlighting cooperation between China and the world, the 30-second ad is also expected to help organize an effective counterattack against the emerging protectionism throughout the world.
The author is a professor at Zhongnan University of Economics and Law.
(China Daily 12/24/2009 page8)
