中国对美国公司加强监管 消费者获益

During the past year, Chinese anti-monopoly watchdogs raided four Microsoft offices, investigated chip maker Qualcomm, and vowed to punish Audi and several BMW dealers for essentially charging unfair prices. This week, food giant H.J. Heinz Co. found itself in a storm as Chinese regulators said they found “severely high levels of lead” in the company’s infant cereals.

去年，中国反垄断监管部门曾突访微软（Microsoft）4个办事处、调查芯片制造商高通（Qualcomm），并称要就价格垄断处罚奥迪（Audi）及一些宝马（BMW）汽车经销商。最近一周中国有关部门又发现亨氏（H.J. Heinz Co）婴儿米粉“含铅量严重超标”，将这个食品巨头推向了风口浪尖。

With yet another high-profile investigation of a foreign brand in China, many argue that the government is singling out foreign firms to support domestic players. The European Union Chamber of Commerce in China has written a white paper criticizing the government’s efforts, suggesting the moves are unfair and protectionist. Foreign direct investment into China dropped 16.9% in July from a year ago, giving ammunition to critics of the government’s investigations.

随着一起起针对外国品牌的高调调查，很多评论称中国政府正为了扶植国内企业而排挤外企。中国欧盟商会（European Union Chamber of Commerce）发表了一份白皮书，批评中国政府的此类举动，表示这些举措并不公平，属于保护主义行径。今年7月，中国的外商直接投资（Foreign direct investment）比去年下跌16.9%，更令外界有了批评政府调查的理由。

But are critics of China’s anti-trust investigations right? Or do they indicate attempts by the government to catch up to international standards and even the playing field to eventually create more competition and spur more consumption through lower prices?

但这些对中国反垄断调查的批评正确吗？还是说，中国的反垄断调查实际上显示了政府正在向国际标准靠拢，甚至正在改善整体的商业环境，从而最终创造更多竞争，并通过更低的价格带动更多消费？

First, it is a mistake to lump the anti-monopoly investigations and the consumer safety watchdogs together. The safety regulators have targeted McDonald’s , KFC, and now Heinz for selling tainted, mislabeled and toxic products to Chinese consumers. Executives have been fined and jailed. These companies have undoubtedly made mistakes that have endangered the health of Chinese consumers. McDonald’s, for instance, sold hamburgers made with expired meat.

首先，我们不应该将反垄断调查和消费者安全监督混为一谈。安全监管部门瞄准了麦当劳（McDonald’s）、肯德基（KFC）以及现在的亨氏，原因是这些公司向中国消费者出售受污染的、有毒及虚假食品。涉案高管已被处以罚款及监禁。这些公司危害中国消费者的健康，错误昭然。比如麦当劳就出售用过期肉制作的汉堡包。

The Chinese government is moving to safeguard the food supply chain in response to citizens’ demands. Food and product safety and pollution are the two biggest concerns in China – ahead of paying for medical care and education for family members, according to 5000 interviews my firm, The China Market Research Group, conducted in 2013 across15 cities. In response, the government for instance has been pushing for consolidation within the dairy sector – just as it had in the steel industry – to ensure better quality control and curb environmental degradation.

中国政府正在响应民众要求，捍卫食品供应链安全。2013年中国市场研究集团曾在15个城市采访5,000名民众，结果显示，污染以及食品和消费品安全排在家庭医疗费用及教育支出之前，是中国目前最受关注的两大焦点。为此，中国政府已采取不同措施，例如推动乳制品业整合，就像过去促进钢材制造业整合一样，从而确保实现更好的质量控制，防止环境进一步恶化。

Second, many companies, such as Qualcomm and Microsoft , have come under fire in other jurisdictions like Europe for monopolistic practices in the past. Regulators investigated them and fined them over the course of several decades, while in China these companies have gotten a relatively free pass. Until recently, the Chinese government was overwhelmed by other priorities like poverty reduction and did not devote significant resources into things like anti-monopoly investigations.

其次，许多公司，比如高通及微软也曾因为垄断在欧洲等其它司法管辖区受罚。欧洲等地的监管部门过去数十年来一直在调查并处罚这些公司的垄断行为，但是这些企业在中国却面对着相对宽松自由的环境。中国政府过去一直致力于脱贫等更重要的任务，因而并未向反垄断调查等事宜专门投入大量资源，但情况最近已有所改变。

Some media reports have painted the wave of investigations as a sudden anti-foreign crackdown, suggesting that it is a move by President Xi Jinping to consolidate power. However, companies have been aware that investigations like these would be coming for some time now. China’s National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), the body charged with enforcing a portion of the anti-monopoly law, announced the start of many of these investigations in 2011. Xi did not take office until 2012 – a year later.

部分媒体报道把车企反垄断调查描绘成一场突如其来的排外行为，并暗示这是中国国家主席习近平为巩固政权所采取的行动。但多家企业现在已意识到这类调查将持续一段时间。负责部分反垄断法执行的中国国家发展和改革委员会（NDRC）声称，其中一些调查早在2011年就已展开。而习近平出任中国国家主席是在之后的2012年。

The series of investigations has given the appearance of a targeted crackdown, though in many ways the reason for this is simply that regulators are only now catching up with the task of regulating the market and reaching standards of market behavior held by other advanced economies. Domestic Chinese firms have also been targeted – many of the BMW dealers targeted for instance are locally owned by Chinese entrepreneurs, not BMW itself. However, these cases have not been in Western news as much.

这一系列调查呈现出一种有针对性的打击模式，但从许多方面来看，这样做的原因很简单——监管部门现在开始着手规范市场，以达到其它发达国家的市场行为标准。中国国内的企业也成为调查目标，例如宝马公司的一些经销商其实隶属于当地企业。然而，这些情况在西方的新闻里并不会被大肆报道。

It is true that regulators need to be more transparent in their investigations and rulings; they should allow lawyers representing the firms under investigation into meetings when decisions and judgments are made. The opaque way many investigations have been carried out has given the appearance of the government making decisions in back rooms to strong-arm brands into lowering their prices.

的确，监管者需要让他们的调查和裁决更加透明化；他们应该允许律师代表被调查企业参与到判决结果的会议当中。而很多不透明的调查，已经给外界一种政府暗中制定决策并强迫品牌降价的印象。

Finally, although the investigations are hurting profit margins and making executives nervous for now, in the long-term, this will help overall profitability for Chinese and Western brands alike.

最后，尽管这些调查目前影响了企业的利润率，也令管理人员惶惶不可终日，不过从长远来看，这将有助于提升中国乃至西方汽车品牌整体的盈利能力。

Over the past decade, Chinese consumers have been so worried about poor food and product safety standards that they tend to buy the most expensive items they could afford. For key items, such as infant milk formula, consumers shun more affordable brands because they equate lower prices with lower safety. As a result, a few ultra-premium players with high prices have dominated the market, while other brands that aren’t naturally premium-positioned have had little choice but to use high pricing to attract consumer interest.

过去十年间，中国的消费者由于担心食品质量差、产品安全标准低，所以宁愿尽己所能去购买最贵的产品。而对于一些重要的产品，比如婴儿配方奶粉，消费者往往会回避那些价格更实惠的品牌，因为他们认为便宜就等同于食品安全没有保障。导致一些高价的超高档品牌占据了市场，而其它不属于高端定位的品牌则别无选择，只能通过提高价格来吸引消费者。

Promoting better accountability on safety will allow consumers to be more confident in product quality standards and make decisions based on other factors than simply price. In turn, that will give brands the opportunity to carve out new market niches rather than race each other to the top.

建立更好的产品安全问责机制，可以让消费者对产品质量标准更有信心，在决定购买意向时不再只看价格，综合考虑其它因素。这样一来，品牌也将得到更多机会开拓新的市场定位，而不是只在价格上你追我赶。（财富中文网）

Shaun Rein is the founder and managing director of China Market Research Group, a strategic market intelligence firm focused on China. He is author of the forthcoming book, The End of Copycat China: the Rise of Creativity, Innovation, and Individualism in Asia, which is expected to release in October.

雷小山是战略市场情报公司中国市场研究集团（China Market Research Group）的创始人兼董事总经理。他的新书《中国山寨走向终结：创意，创新，以及个人主义在亚洲崛起》预计将于今年10月出版。