Chapter 708 East African Standards Association
In August 1887, the British Parliament passed an insulting trademark law provision, which specifically stipulated that goods imported from Germany must be marked "Made in Germany" to distinguish inferior German goods from high-quality British goods.
Putting down the newspaper in his hand, Ernst felt a little emotional. Some things will not change just because of the intrusion of East Africa, such as the latest Trademark Law in the UK.
Overall, the UK changed its trademark law because it felt pressured by the rapid increase in industrial strength of countries such as Germany, which was a suppression of developing countries by advanced countries.
Even if it is other countries, as long as they pose a threat to the UK, they will enjoy the same treatment as Germany now. So this is an inevitable trend of history, unless a stupid prime minister appears in the UK and lobby the parliament to let Germany go.
This situation is almost impossible to happen. After all, the British are now known for their stability. Unless there is an "anti-intellectual" wave in the whole society like in the past, and then these politicians are kidnapped through the "democratic system", "lies" are not popular in British society now.
Back to the impact of the provisions of the bill, let’s not talk about the emotional damage this straightforward humiliation has caused to the Germans, but East Africa, as a "copycat country", has indeed felt the cold wind.
After all, many East African products are said to be knockoffs of German products. For Britain, East African industrial products are knockoffs among knockoffs.
When it comes to the formulation of standards, the Heilongjiang Xingen Group and East African state-owned enterprises should be viewed separately. Most of the companies under the Heilongjiang Xingen Group are innovative companies that attach importance to product quality.
However, the state-owned enterprises, which are the mainstay of East Africa's national economy, have great deficiencies in this regard, especially when it comes to "copying" Germany, the "copycat superpower".
There is no way around it. The construction of East Africa's industrial system began in the 1970s, basically from scratch with a full set of industrial machines imported from Germany and Austria, so it was inevitable to go down this path.
The process of building an industry from scratch is just like the famine victims who are so hungry that they will eat anything they can get. They will fill their stomachs first. Those who were really particular would have starved to death long ago.
So, when Britain now attacks "German goods", it is actually indirectly attacking "East African goods". Moreover, Germany's technology is updated very quickly, so East Africa may suffer greater losses than Germany.
"What the British said was unpleasant to hear, but it was basically true. For Germany's large, medium and small enterprises and the German government, this was a very humiliating political and economic event, which had an extremely adverse impact on the country's image. It also marked a new stage in the competition between the two countries for the commodity market. We can even regard this incident as the beginning of the transfer of the world's factory," Ernst told industrial officials.
Don’t underestimate the negative impact of this “insult”. In fact, it also represents Britain’s recognition that it is “helpless” to compete with German industry, and is a manifestation of being forced into a corner.
Since Britain led the First Industrial Revolution, it is still the "world factory" today. But now Britain has competitors, including Germany, the United States, France... The rise of a number of industrial countries has posed a huge threat to British industry and commerce, and Germany is the "first bird" that the British want to hit.
Putting quality aside, German products are indeed cheap, and Germany's industrial production capacity has greatly improved, with large shipments. Coupled with methods such as "copying" and "private labeling", the appearance of products can be restored one-to-one to the "genuine".
So Ernst could easily imagine the scene when the British bought the "domestic products" and then found out the flaws when they used them, and then cursed at home.
"Our export enterprises are essentially part of the German commodity export trade system, so they will inevitably be affected by this incident. This is a good warning for us. The standardization of domestic commodity quality should also be put back on the agenda to change the international community's stereotype of our products!"
Ernst attached great importance to standardization, but East Africa had no power to promote such things before. After all, the machines were all imported from Europe, so they could only follow other people's rules. Moreover, the talent pool in East Africa at that time was obviously unable to push East African industry towards independent innovation.
East Africa does not actually have this capability now, but the reserve of basic technical personnel in East Africa should be sufficient. On the one hand, there are returning overseas students, and on the other hand, there is a surge in the number of middle school students.
However, there is a big difference between theoretical learning and actual conditions. If the younger generation is to directly transform East Africa's industrial system, there will probably be a long road of "frustrations" ahead.
"It should not be difficult for the government and enterprises to set up relevant standard-setting bodies, based on the current situation in East Africa, especially to assess the commodity standards in East Africa on the basis of the original commodity classification."
Prior to this, East Africa did have a primary enterprise-level commodity classification, but this commodity classification was based on sacrificing national products.
In order to compete in the international market, we can only select those products with excellent quality and then sell them in the international market, while the defective products should be consumed domestically.
However, for the people of East Africa, they still feel that supply exceeds demand, which has a lot to do with production capacity. East Africa is not an industrial country now. In addition to the low urbanization rate, the number of industries is also a big problem.
In the early 19th century, the standard for industrial countries should be that the urbanized population reached more than 30%, but until now the urbanization level in East Africa is less than 20% (including the black population). However, if the black population is removed, East Africa will immediately become much more beautiful.
Moreover, many cities in East Africa should be considered as mixed agricultural and industrial settlements, especially in the west and north. Many cities were created by administrative means rather than industrialization.
Currently, the only countries recognized as having completed industrialization are Britain, France, Germany and the United States, while others like the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Tsarist Russia, Spain, East Africa and Japan are still catching up.
Of course, East Africa is developing most rapidly in several industrial sectors where it is making full efforts, mainly steel, electricity, automobiles and food processing.
A negative example is that the textile and machinery manufacturing industries are relatively weak, and East Africa needs to import from the Far East and Germany every year.
“In establishing a standardization body, we need to discuss and exchange ideas with the royal family and several large foreign-funded enterprises, who have rich experience in this area.”
Royal enterprises and large foreign-funded enterprises together with the Hexingen Bank, also known as the Hexingen Group, were the earliest organization to set commodity standards.
This is related to the industry that the Hei Xingen Group is engaged in. For example, East African state-owned enterprises cannot meet the conditions of the Hei Xingen Group, but they are also more standard than many small business workshops in Europe and the United States.
However, there are many enterprises run by local governments in East Africa. The quality of their products varies greatly, but apart from the textile and food processing industries, they are also the mainstay of East Africa's light industry.
“The Ministry of Industry will take the lead, and other foreign-funded enterprises in East Africa will supervise and guide the establishment of an institution to provide guidance on the quality of East African commodity production, and it will be named the East African Standards Association.”
The East African Standards Association is actually a replica of the previous German Standards Association, which was not established until 1917.
It was originally just a non-governmental organization and was later incorporated into the German government. In East Africa, this was directly facilitated by the state, which is the difference between the two.
(End of this chapter)
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