President Hugo Chávez promotes cheap Chinese appliances on TV

[naaman fletcher]

TV
By Igor I. Solar.
+
Caracas - Under the promotional slogan "My house is well equipped,” President of Venezuela Hugo Chávez appears on Venezuelan TV offering a wide range of Chinese made home appliances “on credit and no down payment."

With this advertising campaign, Chávez follows a similar publicity blitz launched previously with the name "My car with natural gas," which offers free repairs to vehicles using natural gas instead of gasoline.

In the TV promo President Chávez offers laundry machines at 40 percent below the market price, water-heaters with a savings of 49.5 percent, stoves for 26.2 percent less, and window-type air-conditioners with an amazing 60 percent discount. All discount prices refer to the regular market price of similar appliances sold in the “capitalistic market”. The president emphasizes that all the appliances are of “excellent quality and extremely energy efficient”.

According to its News Agency (in Spanish), the Venezuelan Government will soon market about 25 thousand electrical white line appliances out of a total of 300 thousand units purchased from the manufacturer Haier Electrical Appliances Corp. under an agreement signed with China. The cooperation agreement between China and Venezuela was signed in May 2010 with the aim of creating a new distribution system of basic home necessities, promoting competition and fair trade, and to eradicate speculation.
President Chávez, speaking in Spanish, exhibits his competent salesmanship skills in the promotional clip which can be seen here.


Read more: http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/297590#ixzz0zg9WdYKj

Buy cheap chinese crap with your new credit card. Chavez would make the Bush family proud.

[CJvR]

1. Shouldn't he...

... make sure there is enough power before sending people out on an appliance shopping spree?

[bherrera]

2. I think it is related to the elections

I suspect it is related to the next elections for the parliament of Venezuela. Politicians of all kinds love to give these things and make announcements to win, and Chavez is not unique. But the problem they should solve are deeper and i think inflation and the high crime rate are items they seem unable to solve, which is why the popularity of the Chavez party is lower now.

[killbotfactory]

3. New appliances are more efficient

And they have addressed the power problem which was in large part caused by drought.

[Name removed]

4. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[naaman fletcher]

6. They have not addressed the power problem.

The power problem is as bad as ever. Previously it was blamed on the drought, now it is being blamed on sabotage. The other possibility of course is mis-management and lack of infrastructure investment.

[Peace Patriot]

5. The washing machines may be cheap but I wouldn't say they are crap. They are a necessity

--unless you think that the peasants ought to go back to pounding their clothes in the river.

Making necessary appliances available to the poor and "fair trade" are good ideas. So is energy efficiency. We'll see if the Venezuelan government is better than our own at quality control. Our government has certainly allowed a lot of "cheap crap" (not to mention poisonous crap) to come in here. It's too early to know if Venezuela's government will permit the "anything goes"/fuck the consumer corporate culture that has characterized U.S./Chinese trade. But I would guess that the Chavez government would be inclined to do the opposite.

According to the Haier Corporation's web site, they intend "to help Venezuelan government to build the local industry of household electrical appliances."

http://www.haier.com/news/view.asp?newsid=865

According to this investment site, the "joint venture will promote the use of parts produced in Venezuela to assemble its major appliances," and is also "aimed at developing products with high energy efficiency, clean technology and in accordance to country’s industrial progress."

http://www.conapri.org/English/ArticleDetailIV.asp?articleid=357030&CategoryId2=15041

These sound like good goals to me--especially having some of the manufacturing take place in Venezuela, which SHOULD HAVE BEEN REQUIRED in U.S./China trade deals and WASN'T.

Your summation--"Buy cheap chinese crap with your new credit card."--extrapolates our experience to Venezuela. But is it inherently bad to provide low cost, necessary appliances, partially made in Venezuela? Is it inherently bad for the poor to have access to credit? As to the latter, it was only when the banksters started bankstering--lying to credit card customers, gouging them, taking wild advantage of them, in the criminal meltdown of our financial system--that they became a problem (people suddenly finding their interest rate or monthly payments quadrupled for no good reason). That is not likely to happen with a government issued credit card in Venezuela. Another credit card problem here has been caused by the Great Capitalist Squeeze, whereby the elderly, for instance, cannot afford medical care, and are forced to put what may be life-saving medical care on their credit cards, or middle class families can't afford tuition any more, and put it on credit cards. But Venezuelans have access to free medical care, and access to free education through college. They don't have to put huge costs like this on credit cards. And a modest purchase--a necessary item, that improves their own quality of life, and is benefiting their own economy (with jobs)--and that would be out of their league as to price, provided at a greatly reduced price--that seems a wise use of a credit card.

Washing machines, refrigerators, air conditioners--these are quality of life items. Yes, you can go without them, if you have to, but their lack creates hardship and limitation for you and your family, as to participating in modern life. Think of not having clean clothes to wear every day to school or work. Or think of having to deal with no refrigeration. Is it not a good thing that the poor can obtain these items, at low cost and on credit?

I think our situation and theirs is so significantly different that you can't extrapolate, as you have. You sneer and snipe, but that is not analysis. I've discussed the best aspects of this Venezuela/China deal. We'll see how it works out. None of us can know that. And merely taking a cheap shot at it, before the thing is even off the ground, is like all the other propaganda we get from the corpo-fascist press against the Chavez government, which fails to explain--and NEVER reports the reasons for--the Chavez government's huge popularity (60% range), lo these many years. (Chavez's personal approval rating just zoomed back up, by the way--65% in "the most respected" poll in Venezuela, according to Reuters. Politicians who have FAILED for ten years don't get bounces like that. It just doesn't happen. So, how come it did? No clue in the corpo-fascist press, which has treated all the positive news out of Venezuela for the last ten years as it if it didn't happen.)