Quality means survival

The final sales reports aren’t in yet, but it looks like 2006 is not going to be a good year for the local fireworks industry.

Manufacturers are complaining that they are losing business to imports and even to the hit of the season, the bazooka-like boga — a noisemaker with a powerful bang fashioned out of a PVC pipe mounted on a metal toy gun.

The shoulder-fired boga, fueled by denatured alcohol, is the updated version of the traditional "cannons" fashioned mostly out of bamboo and fired from the ground.

The boga is a dangerous toy — its debut last year caused injuries in Cavite — but I guess that’s part of its appeal. For macho Pinoy New Year’s Eve revelers, "fountains" and even banned powerful firecrackers such as pla-pla (a giant tilapia; where do the manufacturers get these names?) are for sissies.

The piccolo, imported mainly from Taiwan, is all the rage as well this season. That accident in Ormoc involving a piccolo is unlikely to lessen the appeal of the small firecracker, which can be set off reportedly by rubbing it against any rough surface, like the tetanus-inducing watusi.

Authorities have made the expected noises about enforcing laws banning certain types of firecrackers.

The secretary of health proposed the other day that all firecrackers be banned as he noted that there were 173 firecracker-related injuries already recorded in government hospitals nationwide, with New Year’s Eve still four days away. This will certainly be good for public health but could finally trigger another people power revolt where everything else has failed in the past year and a half.

Nothing comes between the Pinoy reveler and his New Year’s Eve fireworks — not even the annual reports of mutilated fingers, disfigured faces and occasional deaths from firecrackers.

The revelry stems from the belief that the new year must be greeted with loud noise and bright lights to drive away bad spirits and attract good luck. It must be something we absorbed from the Chinese, apart from the New Year’s tradition of offering 12 types of round fruits (or 13, depending on your Chinese adviser) to the heavens for a bountiful year and serving noodles for long life.

Or perhaps we simply enjoy every excuse for feasting and wild celebration.

That gritty determination to be merry even after a year of hardship, poverty and hunger should translate into brisk business for the local fireworks industry.

Instead, like other local industries that never prepared for globalization, fireworks manufacturers are feeling the pinch of foreign competition.

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Those manufacturers should bear in mind the admonition of Prof. Rene Domingo of the Asian Institute of Management: quality means survival.

This is especially true for industries that face foreign competition. In the global economy, quality can make or break a business.

Certain sectors of the economy, such as agriculture, will enjoy government protection for several more years; even industrialized countries protect their own farmers. But most other sectors will either sink or swim in the face of foreign competition. The tide of globalization is too powerful to turn back.

Unfortunately for many local fireworks manufacturers, innovation stopped with pla-pla, super lolo and the "Judas belt" which lengthened into the "python" or sawa.

So revelers tried out imports mostly from Taiwan and even Belgium. And although the products were pricier, consumers liked what they got: better fireworks displays, consistent quality and reliable safety features.

The local products don’t come cheap. If you have money to throw away on giant "fountains" and rows and rows of "pythons," you can afford to buy more expensive fireworks from abroad. For the biggest consumers of fireworks, money is often no object.

So local manufacturers should have concentrated on keeping their customers happy, by investing in quality control.

This includes complying with safety standards imposed by law (we actually have one that governs fireworks manufacturing) and investing in research to develop new products. People need new stimuli for all their senses, whether in food, entertainment or New Year’s Eve revelry.

Instead local manufacturers stuck to the same tried and tested products, ignoring safety standards from manufacturing to the sale of fireworks.

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You see the images every year: fireworks being fashioned by hand in backyard factories where half-naked young workers are covered head to foot in toxic ingredients for making explosives. The working areas are shielded from the sun by straw sacks billowing in the breeze.

It can be argued that this has always been the way fireworks have been made in this country. Manufacturers and workers are well aware of the risks of accidents, and consumers are aware of the hazards of mishandling firecrackers. Why should we change the system?

The answer is globalization, where product quality and manufacturing efficiency spell survival. Chinese and Indian manufacturers, for example, have all but killed the Philippine apparel industry.

Not everything is bad news: local entrepreneurs who know how to build on their strengths and enforce quality control have taken on giant foreign competitors and succeeded. Jollibee is the best example, defeating McDonald’s in this country with tasty burgers and sweet spaghetti. Max’s survived the arrival of KFC. San Miguel beer is still the Pinoy’s brand of choice.

Slow business this year may finally bring home to the local fireworks industry the urgency of enforcing quality control and constant innovation. With better products, they can even find a bigger market and sell to the world.

They have an entire year to adjust to their new circumstances. It’s a good New Year’s resolution: to compete in a global environment by aiming to be the best.