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Deadly blast and land grab show need to reflect on anything-goes mode of growth
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A deadly blast on Saturday at a wheel hub-polishing workshop in Kunshan, Suzhou, has already killed over 70 workers.
On such occasions, there are customary charges of negligence of safety standards.
I also think about our food safety in general.
Suzhou lies in an area of fertility, proverbially one of the two earthly paradises in China, a watery land flowing with milk and honey.
It is now a powerful manufacturing engine, a mecca for migrants from other provinces who choose to mend their fortunes by not being peasants.
In turning China into a nation on wheels, the small plant in Kunshan had done its bit, not only supplying GM, but probably in a small way having saved the auto giant that stood on the brink of bankruptcy a few years back.
Think again of the evolving food scandal at Husi in Shanghai.
It hints at a new mode of feeding us. Rotten meat is processed at assembly line manned by Chinese minimum-wage earners, then aggressively marketed to eager Chinese children and adults.
A similar pattern exists with the Kunshan plant. Here an unhealthy and destructive way of life is aggressively sold to Chinese consumers, at no small advantage to the absentee brand owners in the US.
Local officials are growing addicted to the kind of growth possible with manufacturing.
Last Friday, in a village in Jilin Province, a dozen villagers, in defending their farmland, suddenly turned against chengguan (urban management personnel) entrusted with taking over their farmland. In the scuffle the chengguan chief was hacked to death, while two villagers were wounded.
Our officials have become disdainful of the mundane way of livelihood based on traditional farming.
We used to be proud about our food self-sufficiency. In the age of globalization, we are no longer so sure.
Although we are no longer satisfied with the slow growth of crops, occasionally we still panic at how innovative we can be in speeding up the growth of crops. In Wuhan an investigative reporter bought five bags of rice at local stores, three of which later were identified to contain genetically modified strains.
The exposure was followed by a brief period of popular shock and indignation.
Unlike General Motors or KFC, the real drivers of genetically modified technology choose to lie low.
There are reports that with GM crops the farmers will have to purchase seeds from companies like Monsanto.
The hands that feed us
We might wax indignant at the mention of GM rice for the time being, but there is the challenge of feeding a nation of over a billion on shrinking farmland.
It has been reported recently that in Sihong, Jiangsu Province, some newly built highways have been buried in thick earth hauled in by heavy trucks, with a noticeboard planted therein proclaiming, “Here soyabeans have already been sowed.” It is a message meant for a state-level inspection team whose task is to ensure that local governments are not too reckless in turning farmland into real estate. Still, the audacity defies our wildest imagination.
Sihong is also the home of seven peasants who, unsatisfied with demolition of their homes, chose to drink poison at the gate of a newspaper a couple of weeks ago, so as to have their grievances heard in Beijing.
But these scandals combined were not nearly so sensational as the Husi food scare.
These scandals show officials at all levels have demonstrated an eagerness to outsource the dirty job of feeding ourselves to our global business partners.
A strong rationalization for this is the mandate for growth. You never expect decent growth from traditional farming. You might have a bumper harvest this year, but your fortune next year is subject to the whims of the heavens as well as your industriousness.
Industrialization, the use of chemicals or GM technology might fuel growth, but there is a limit.
When we choose to eat at others’ hands, we should not be choosers. When we willingly lose sight of the fields that feed us, we need not be too fussy.
How many of us can afford the energy to send our food for a genetic test?
How many of us can be privileged to have an insider look at the assembly line, as that disgruntled Husi employee?
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