Q3. Several problems which hinder ethical products from entering the mainstream consumer market are mentioned in the article. Which of those problems apply to your home country? How can such problems be solved?
Nowadays, people are not surprised to see such words as “environmentally friendly products” or “ethical products” when shopping. In the process of producing or using many traditional products, wastes or wasted gases are produced as well, which indeed do harm to our environment. Such ethical products come out to lessen the pollution from what people consume. It is really a nice idea; however, in China, there are some problems hindering ethical products from entering the mainstream consumer market: 1. many consumers do not have such conscience to buy ethical products; 2. the price of those products are usually much higher than the traditional ones; 3. the products there are not sufficient for consumers to choose.
Lacking of awareness may be the first problem. For a long time, people consume in order to satisfy themselves and most of them seldom consider the impact of their consumption to environment. This is exactly most people think in China. I think school education can do much to change the situation. If schools can teach students that what people buy would have an impact on their living environment and people should treat the world more kindly, they may probably have the conscience to buy ethical products even when they are young. In such a way, at least most educated people will buy ethical products. Also, the promotion from the sellers is very important, because people can learn more about ethical products in the promotion when they are consuming everywhere. And they may be influenced by the promotion or advertisements. Besides, public figures can make a difference in the area, because they have such a significant influence on the public. One example is that high-fashion retail queen Christina Ong who set up stores selling “wholesome munchies” (Tan, 2007). What she did can definitely appeal the public’s attention.
Another problem is the high price of ethical products. Usually, in China, the ethical products are more expensive. This may be due to the lower demand and the normally higher cost of ethical products. If more are demanded, more ethical products will be produced. Thus the average cost becomes lower. Naturally the price may fall down. Or, if new advanced technology can be applied in manufacturing, the cost probably may be reduced also. Of course, people are more willing to purchase the nice goods charging less. So such cases that like the environmentally safe dishwashing liquid in Singapore is twice or triple price than that in Australia (Tan, 2007) would not happen in China. And Chinese government should show their support to producing ethical products technologically and financially. Government should give money to those companies for research to find advanced manufacturing technology. Or even government can pay for the difference of the prices that consumers are willing to pay and that producers are willing to produce. As a result, both producers and consumers are satisfied and so that ethical products definitely will be in the mainstream market.
Last but not least, the situation that the ethical products now in the market are not sufficient for consumers to choose. Here, maybe the government should take more responsibility. Government should encourage the development of industry of ethical products to make sure consumers can choose among various products. If it is not easy to set up many factories to solve this problem, increase of import can be considered. Increase of the variety of ethical products may help themselves a lot to enter the mainstream market.
If consumers are more aware when shopping, companies show more responsibility to society and government support ethical products more, it is possible that ethical products will share the mainstream market soon even there are still some problems. It is the responsibility of every individual to buy ethical products to lessen the harm to environment. The first thing to do is purchasing environmentally friendly products.
References:
Wei, T. D. (2007, February 11). Buying a better world. The Straits Time, p. L6