Resources

As well as providing accurate information on where consumer goods come from, we also want to provide you with links to articles on the issues. That's one of the reasons why we're a country of origin resource, and not just a database.

Outsourcing
Most global IT brands use subcontractors to make their products, especially in China. The Wall Street Journal published a ground-breaking article a few years ago about a key Apple subcontractor, and it remains one of the best resources on the subject. There have been other reports of life inside subcontractor factories and assembly plants, such as these ones from the UK Mail on Sunday, from www.macworld.com and from www.pcpro.co.uk. Apple's response can be found at www.appleinsider.com and at the PC Pro site, which also follows up the story with a report on unions at the main facility. This article gives another insight into it. The original iPhone supply chain has been looked into, by texyt.com and here, and there's an update on the 3G model here. The latest Greenpeace report questions the iPhone's environmental impact. The iPhone girl became popular in 2008 and you can see her at macrumours.com and here.
  

You can read about the subcontractors some other companies use in this UK Guardian article, and Dell, Lenovo, Microsoft and HP are featured in this report from February 2009.
 

Why making things matters
Assembling products first can lead to innovation and new opportunities later, as this Business Week report shows. If you don't make enough things, and you try to import almost everything you can buy, your economy can end up with serious trade deficits. For just how bad a problem this can be, see www.iousathemovie.com, which has a 30 minute version of the acclaimed documentary. A good overview of all the arguments about why manufacturing matters can be found on Bill Waddell's site. The current series of articles on manufacturing in the Harvard Business Review is probably one of the best resources around at the moment, for the depth of the coverage by writers and commentators, like in this one by Ed Catmull, CEO of Pixar, criticising short-termism in Wall Street.

Making things also needs a vast reserve of strategic metals and minerals, and if you have enough of them you can guarantee the future of your industries for years ahead. That's why some people talk about a sort of Copper Standard instead of a Gold Standard to back up currencies. This UK  commentator explains how he thinks this will play out, and what the consequences might be for the US and the rest of the world.

Lithium
Lithium is set to be one of the most contested resources this century. Its use is widespread in consumer electronics but it's also essential to the first generation of practical electric cars. There have been some good articles in the UK press this year. The Daily Mail published this excellent piece in April, and the themes have been updated in this article from the Times which stresses the competition between Japan and China for access to Bolivia's deposits (50% of the world's future supplies). However, the website worldlithium.com has reports which dispute the shortage argument. There's also an informative archive article on lithium supplies in Tibet providing most of China's needs at Green Energy News.

The struggle for resources
Apart from Lithium, the world's active powers are seeking out other strategic resources to keep their economies going in the years ahead. No international agreements or myths of 'globalisation' cover this battle: it's every nation for itself. China is pursuing oil and gas supplies the world over, most notably through agreements with Russia, Brazil, and Turkmenistan, and it recently took over an oil company in Kazakhstan. Many countries are also involved in a land-grab, especially in Africa, to control land that can export food back home. For an insight into the struggle and conflict over precious metals and minerals, www.leberjeweler.com has some fascinating links.