Lots of news the past three or four years re: bad product/shoddy suppliers coming from China.  For an excellent nickel tour on what the issue of supplier control means and how it comes up, see this China Law Blog post, How To Monitor Your Chinese Factory, The China Price and QC By Motorcycle. After you read this you can see how darn hard it can be to do this well.

Having said this, are there a number of bad suppliers in China?  Of course. They get the press. Are there many good suppliers? Of course.  They do not as much press.

What can you add to this topic and debate?   What have you seen or what you seeing out there?

These are the types of questions I want you to be thinking about as we will explore this issue more when we visit some factories in southern China.

And for the best blog I know that deals with the issue of sourcing from China and quality inspection and assurance, see David Dayton’s blog, Silk Road International.  I think he has just about seen it all, in this area - the good, the bad and the ugly.