By Richard N. Baldwin T. /HispanicVista.com

By Richard N. Baldwin T. /HispanicVista.com
Of Cats, Dogs, Cabbages and Kings

 

     Whether you are in the market to purchase cat and dog food or not, there are some interesting things about the recent recall of defective cat food.

     What started out to be reports of sick and dying pets in the US progressed into a massive recall of pet foods that spanned over 100 brands of food. Many cats were sickened and over 16 died. The recall spanned Canada, the US and México. More interesting is that the products recalled comprised so many seemingly unrelated brands. And the affected animals spanned the US.

     The problem was traced to one company in Canada that supplied the pet food to all of those brand providers that were on the long list. One supplier to the Canadian company was found to have contaminated their shipments with a plastic material that has no business in any food product. Another supplier to the Canadian company that provides a key ingredient to the "wet" type of foods had included rat poison in their shipments. Again, not a recognized diet supplement for pet food.

     In this case, the problem did not affect foods for human consumption, but it illustrates a growing problem in the global free trade structure.

     One company in Canada is making pet food for a significant portion for the general pet food market in the US, regardless of the brands. You may think that by changing brands of products, you are getting a different product made by a different company. Not necessarily so.

     Also of note is that by crossing national borders, you get into different agency regulations on how much of what kind of contaminant is allowed. In Canada, there are different standards for the plastic material ingredient than in the US. With China, who knows what standards they have? And yes, some of the ingredients came from China.

     Last year, there was another giant recall, this time with human food; leaf spinach. This time there were human deaths involved and again, many different brand names. It was traced to a small area in California that a concentrated group of farms supply (again) a significant portion of the leaf spinach market in the US. It seems that the irrigation water was contaminated by runoff from an animal feed lot for the meat industry.

     A rechargeable battery maker in China was found to have a design flaw for their products that are marketed under various brands and used by different computer makers all over the world. This design flaw could cause your lap top computer to explode while on your lap. Lots of excitement over that one.

     What we are leading up to here is the fact that in our new global free trade age, we see more and more concentrations of the market in fewer and fewer giant firms that span the globe. Instead of encouraging competition between companies, we see larger multinational giants controlling increasing sectors of the world market. And when you are as big as many of these companies are, you also control the pricing.

     You purchase a product, like your TV or computer. It says "Made in the United States", or "Made in México", or Canada or elsewhere. Then you look inside and find that the components are coming from all over the world. I can remember when General Motors marketed a "World Car" where components came from all over the world. Now all autos are world cars.

     But if you really want to get into pricing, look at the oil market. Do you remember how many oil companies there were in the US twenty-five years ago? Now, you can count all of them on one hand.

     México has a "competitivity commission" that is designed to prevent unreasonable control of the markets by a few giants. Something like what is in the US. But in México, this commission has less strength than the monopolies. Even our "business friendly" administration admits this and calls for strengthening our anti-monopoly laws. Telecommunications, cement, beer, corn and banking are controlled by only a small handful of families. That's why we pay double, triple or more for many of the basic products and services than other fully developed countries, and at a fraction of the national earnings rate.

     The same trend is taking place in the US. And what makes it more complicated is the multinational character to the new global economy.

     If you want to get right down to it, national security issues get into play here.

     Where is Teddy Roosevelt now that we need him? 

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Richard N. Baldwin T., a HispanicVista.com (http://www.hispanicvista.com/) contributing columnist, lives in Tlalnepantla, Edo de México. E-mail at: R1041643422@aol.com