Angry in the Great White North

The newswires are carrying a story reporting on the widespread Chinese practise of using tap water or recovered bottled water in what is supposed to be water coolers with fresh pure water:

Up to half of the water used in water coolers across China's capital could be "fake", or not as pure as its manufacturers claim, state media said on Tuesday of the latest in a series of health scares.

The bogus water was either tap water or purified water of miscellaneous small brands poured into empty barrels sealed with quality standard marks, the China Daily said, quoting Liu Xiaoyun, the Beijing sales manager of a bottled water brand.

Liu said the counterfeits began to appear in Beijing in 2002, five years after barrelled, as opposed to bottled, water emerged as an industry.

In some provinces, 80% of the barrelled water was fake.

This is a Chinese problem. Canadians don't drink water imported from China. But the Beijing Olympics are just around the corner. It will be interesting to see just what the national teams do. Will wealthier Western countries ship in their own water and other consumables? Will the International Olympic Committee and the Chinese allow that? I'm not sure that it is against the rules, but even if the rules allow it, the Chinese might perceive it as an affront. They might be quite eager for international audiences to know that Chinese products are safe, not just for the regular consumer but for athletes at the highest levels of competition.

If everyone at the Olympics avoids Chinese products, and worse, makes a showing of avoiding them, the Chinese public relation nightmare will only get worse.

I have no doubt that every drop of water provided by the Chinese government for the Olympics will be the real thing, even if everyone else in the egalitarian paradise that is Communist China is forced to drink bacteria-laden tap water.

But even if that's true, I can imagine one or more governments making it clear that their people will not be consuming Chinese water and other products, especially if the stories of unsafe Chinese products continue to be published into next year.

Update: In fact, the Chinese are working hard on making sure the athletes are given top-notch Chinese-sourced food and drink:

China, under scrutiny following a series of health scares, has vowed to closely monitor the quality of food served to athletes during next year's Olympics, state media reported on Tuesday.

The government has set up a rigorous system to control the quality of everything from milk to seafood, Xinhua news agency said.

A series of health scandals have stained the "made in China" brand this year. There have been breaches and deaths involving toxins in food, medicines and other products.

"All the procedures involving Olympic food, including production, processing, packaging, storing and transporting, will be closely monitored," Xinhua quoted Sun Wenxu, an official with the State Administration for Industry and Commerce, as saying.

Athletes, coaches, officials and journalists will probably consume more than 75,000 litres of milk, 330 tons of fruit and vegetables and 750 litres of ketchup during the Olympics, Xinhua cited experts as predicting.

So all that has to happen is for one country to very publicly say "No" to Chinese food and drink for all this public relations effort to be flushed down the loo.