This article cites that Mr. Ma advocates against detrimental environmental effects posed by multinational corporations’ suppliers.

One of the reasons China becomes a popular outsourcing destination for many multinational companies, is its low cost of production. Second, its rich labour resources. As awareness for labour and environmental rights peak, China takes corrective steps to prevent these multinational companies from further exploiting their resources. Naturally, this will increase the cost of productions of the companies, which seek to minimize cost and maximise profits. Besides, further investigation into these issues will lead to revelation of ugly behaviours in production of the outsourcers. Such revelations will relive the undesirable agendas of Apple and Nike labour issues.

With heightened demands from China for the outsources to take preventive steps to avoid environmental damage and labour exploitation, I am curious to know if in future, this will affect the decisions of new companies that consider outsourcing in China. As for companies that have already established supply chains in China, will costs of productions rise to the point that they decide to discontinue outsourcing in China as it is no longer profit-maximising? Would they turn their heads instead to other developing countries with lower labour and environmental awareness?

Source cited:

Gies, Erica. “Advocate Helps Track Polluters on Supply Chain.” The New York Times 22 Apr. 2012. Web. 18 Nov. 2012. <http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/23/business/global/advocate-helps-track-polluters-on-supply-chain.html?pagewanted=all>.

Picture cited:

Butler, Phil. China’s Cyber Warrior In The News Again. 2007. Profy. Web. 18 Nov. 2012. <http://www.google.com/imgres?num=10&um=1&hl=en&tbo=d&biw=1163&bih=562&tbm=isch&tbnid=wt0Lk3PLD2S04M:&imgrefurl=http://profy.com/2007/08/26/china-cyberwars/&docid=iwprcm0yToHCyM&imgurl=http://profy.com>.

Pollution in China. 2011. Web. 18 Nov. 2012. <http://www.google.com/imgres?start=15&num=10&um=1&hl=en&tbo=d&biw=1163&bih=562&tbm=isch&tbnid=qUwqN59sJrI7pM:&imgrefurl=http://crisispictures.blogspot.com/2011/11/pollution-in-china.html&docid=a6VxMMY>.