Recently, Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi’s visit to East Asia has attracted widespread attention. In fact, in addition to making a gesture against China, another important purpose of Pelosi’s trip is to promote the Chip Act. The main purpose of this bill is to transfer chip production in Taiwan, South Korea and other places back to the United States.
Of course, the essence of the “Chip Act” is to curb China’s development, or to promote the “decoupling” of U.S. and Chinese industries.
After World War II, the United States gained financial hegemony, and its own industry gradually began to shift from physical manufacturing to the financial industry. The financial industry is inherently destined to move to places with high profits, and China has been in the process of 30 The engine of global economic development in recent years has made China and the global economy inseparably integrated.
Build Southeast Asia and want to “decouple” from China
However, as a powerful industrialized country with an independent military, China naturally conflicts with the United States’ hegemony of “cutting leeks.” Now that Europe and the United States are inseparable from China’s manufacturing industry, fostering alternatives to China’s manufacturing industry has become the focus of Europe and the United States in recent times.
In addition to high-tech represented by the “Chip Act”, more manufacturing locations are relocating to Southeast Asian countries, especially India and Vietnam. As a traditional manufacturing industry, textiles have obvious feelings about this. Especially in recent years, a large number of foreign first-tier brands have moved their foundries from China to Vietnam, where tariffs are also cheaper than in China. In addition to the overt activities, there are also many activities behind the scenes, such as “Xinjiang cotton” and sweatshops, which are all excuses for wanting to break away from Chinese textiles. It is foreseeable that under the current economic situation, European and American countries, especially the United States, will be increasingly willing to “decouple” from China. In the future, more textile orders will be transferred to Vietnam. Domestic textile companies need to do a good job in this regard preparation.
Industrial transfer is the general trend
But in fact, the country is also happy to see the transfer of some manufacturing industries represented by the textile industry to countries such as Vietnam and India. The RCEP agreement is the best proof. With the continuous development of my country’s textile industry, the benefits generated by some low-end textile industries are no longer as good as the social costs they expend.
A few years ago, some textile bosses complained that it was getting harder and harder to recruit workers. A textile worker’s monthly income ranged from five to six thousand to tens of thousands. Some textile companies also included food and accommodation. To be honest, The money was generous, but at the same time the work was also intense, with long working hours every day and no days off. Now that people’s living standards are higher, they would rather do easier work with less money than work with high intensity in exchange for a higher income. Not to mention that land costs and environmental protection costs are also increasing year by year.
Therefore, some of these high-intensity tasks are replaced by automation, and other parts will inevitably be transferred. And other industries that can really bring profits will still remain.
Value chain and profit distribution
Recently I am reading the book “Pricing Power” by teacher Zhang Jie, which talks about the issue of value chain. Many people believe that as long as the product is good and has unique technology, it can account for the most profits in the industry chain. In fact, this is not entirely true. During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, China’s porcelain and silk were world-renowned and in short supply, but they were bought by Western countries with silver plundered from the Americas. There was a complete imbalance in labor and technology, and the majority of the profits were not made by the manufacturer China. This is a bit Similar to the current situation in the United States, as long as the money printing machine is turned on, it can buy a large amount of goods that China has worked hard to produce.
The main reason for this is liquidity, and behind it lies the issue of national strength and international voice.
After the reform and opening up, our country’s textile industry still suffered a lot of losses in this regard. Take chemical fiber as an example. When China wanted to build a PX factory more than ten years ago, environmental organizations would come out to promote that this fiber caused cancer. People at the time did not understand this aspect, but the media Such publicity, everyone wants toPhysical health naturally resisted it. Of course, there were a lot of industrial pollution incidents at that time, and everyone was easily aroused.
And this ultimately resulted in that although the production capacity of downstream PTA and polyester yarn has been growing, the majority of profits in the industry chain have beenPX Here, andPX has always required large quantities of imports. Especially in 2018, PX suddenly surged, causing PTA Polyester and polyester yarns have exceeded historical highs, causing complaints from downstream companies. Behind the scenes is the reality that a large amount of profits have been harvested by foreign chemical companies.
But after a long time, everyone has understood that except for China, which is really focusing on environmental protection, vigorously planting trees, developing photovoltaic, wind power and other industries, those in Europe and the United States are just business in the end. For example, since the Russian-Ukrainian war, when Europe’s energy is in crisis, environmental protection has been ignored. Old thermal power plants that were originally closed have been reopened. The “environmental protection girl” who was touted a few years ago “Now he is also regarded as a “Russian spy.”
The essence is still a means of harvesting developing countries after the West has gained global discourse power.
Brand and Credit
Another value-rich area in the value chain lies in the brand, and behind the brand is credibility. Among them are the credibility of the brand itself and the credibility of the country. Just like when the reform and opening up was just started, emerging domestic clothing brands often liked to choose “foreign names” to make consumers think they were foreign brands. At that time, European and American technology represented credit, and the United States’ most powerful military in the world also represented credit, which resulted in consumer preference.
With the improvement of our country’s economic development and military strength, our voice in the world has also continued to increase. Especially this time the United States has lost its righteousness, but it has become an opportunity for China to speak out to the world again. Therefore, in the past two years, the concept of “the rise of national trends” has become very attractive to consumers, and the acceptance of Chinese products in the world is also increasing.
At the same time, more and more countries are choosing to use RMB to do business with China, which to some extent represents the recognition of Made in China.
Now is a “big change unseen in a century”, which refers not only to the growth of China’s comprehensive national strength, but also to a series of chain reactions brought about by one ebb and flow. There are challenges here, but More of an opportunity. If textile companies can see the opportunities and seize them, they may usher in rapid development.
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