The past and present of screw plugs
The industrial history of a small screw is the epitome of more than 2,000 years of western scientific and technological development and the industrial revolution. Inventors and entrepreneurs in Europe and the United States invent and innovate screw plugs while formulating industry technical standards; the government makes every effort to protect intellectual property rights, so that enterprises created by these craftsmen can focus on technological progress.
China is now the world's largest fastener producer. There are 6,000 or 7,000 fastener manufacturers in the country, with an annual output of about 8 million tons of fasteners, which are exported to all parts of the world, but no company can do this. Extreme.
In 2007, the EU initiated an anti-dumping investigation on steel fasteners originating in China, involving US$760 million nationwide, and made a final ruling in January 2009, levying anti-dumping duties of up to 85% on the products involved. After years of lawsuits, in February 2016, the EU finally officially canceled the anti-dumping measures against Chinese fasteners. Years of anti-dumping investigations and heavy taxes have caused heavy losses to China's fastener industry. However, this case also sounded the alarm for China's fastener industry: the era of winning by quantity should give way to winning by quality and innovation.
Several years ago, Premier Zhu Rongji raised the issue of nail clippers, and this year, Li Keqiang talked about the issue of ballpoint pens. These are small problems in the eyes of the Chinese public, but in fact they all reflect the big problems made in China.
