September 11, 2008

The global journey of a metal part--North Carolina to Italy, back to U.S., and then exported yet again

The globalization of industries, which rely on production networks that often stretch across borders, means that products often ping-pong among countries, getting counted as exports, imports and exports again at various stages.

Global Journey

A good example is the global journey that occurs when Cyril Bath Co., a small aerospace manufacturer in Monroe, N.C., just outside Charlotte, exports roughly shaped metal ribs for framing the shells of airplanes to a factory in Italy. The Italian plant machines them into finished metal forms, which it ships back to Charleston, S.C., where they are used to build sections of fuselage. Those sections are then flown to Boeing factories in the Pacific Northwest for final assembly. After all that, many of the finished planes are sold for export.

Posted by Anupam Chander on September 11, 2008 at 07:52 AM in Globalization | Permalink