There's been much discussion about China recently in the press, the political arena and among our supply chain partners. American manufacturing has shed more than 2.5 million jobs from the fourth quarter of 2000 through the third quarter of 2003, with "off-shoring" and China being declared principle contributors.

But to paraphrase Mark Twain, domestic manufacturing's demise has been greatly exaggerated. I think that China's impact has been, too.

With the recession of 2001 exacerbated by the events of 9/11, many of us in manufacturing took steps to reconfigure our businesses to improve our competitive position. In Bison's case, we improved our value streams vigorously by continuing to make lean manufacturing improvements, investing and innovating in new products and capital equipment, and strengthening our partnerships within our distribution channels and at our OEM customers.

The results include improved productivity, enhanced service levels and greater customer satisfaction across the board. And Bison is not alone; countless other U.S. firms are now taking these sorts of proactive steps. Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan cites manufacturing productivity as one of the keys to restraining inflation. During the past two decades, U.S. manufacturing productivity has increased twice as fast as the rest of the private sector.

At the national level, manufacturing's importance to U.S. global competitiveness has been recognized by the President's Manufacturing Initiative, led by the National Assn. of Manufacturers and U.S. Commerce Secretary Don Evans (www.nam.org, www.manufacturing.gov).

At the state level, manufacturing summits have been held in many states. We'll be focusing on those issues in Illinois during our own manufacturing summit on June 15 (www.ima-net.org, www.valleyindustrialassociation.org).

Among the areas of competitiveness being addressed are:

• Leveling the international playing field by ensuring that foreign countries, particularly China and other major trading partners, reduce trade barriers, comply with international trade rules and allow markets to determine exchange rates.
• Reducing the cost of producing in the U.S. by containing health care costs, enacting legal reforms, ensuring adequate and affordable energy supplies, and reforming the regulatory process to more effectively assess costs, benefits and impacts on industry.
• Promoting innovation, investment and productivity through tax reforms that boost government R&D, encourage private sector R&D, and provide incentives for domestic capital investment.

Finally, there is much wisdom in seeking out and supporting a North American-based supply chain. Within our supply chain partnerships, trained, motivated people focus on reducing waste and improving the value delivered in our products and services. Trying to duplicate this with a logistics chain stretching half way around the world, with currency problems, a weak banking system and overheated supply challenges should cause purchasers to consider the benefits right here at home.

My name's Ron Bullock and I buy American! It's good business.