CHINA: China proudly laid on a spectacular fireworks display for a group of very important foreign guests in Shanghai last October.
President Bush and other world leaders were treated to the lavish riverside fireworks party, hosted by the Chinese leader, Mr Jiang Zemin, to mark the end of the highly successful APEC summit.
Always keen to put on a good show for the rest of the world, the Chinese proved hospitable hosts for the two-day APEC gathering, spending millions of pounds ensuring that the visit of the illustrious group of political leaders was comfortable and secure.
The fireworks used to crown the summit meeting were all made in China. The assembled political leaders were suitably impressed and awe-struck by the colourful spectacle.
The APEC leaders probably gave little or no thought to where the fireworks came from and to the thousands of death-trap factories all over China where they are produced. A little investigative work and they would have learned that hundreds of people die every year in China making the fireworks which light up the night skies of the US and many more developed countries during festival and holiday times.
Indeed most of the fireworks used in Ireland for Halloween, and those used to celebrate New Year's Eve, were made in China, many of them more than likely made illegally in firework sweatshops.
On December 30th, the latest in a long line of tragedies at fireworks factories across China occurred. More than 40 people were killed in an explosion at the Panda Export Fireworks Co Factory in Huangmao in East China's Jiangxi Province; 200 people are still missing.
A string of explosions flattened the plant, which is owned by a Hong Kong businessman. Such was the force of the explosions that windows in houses in a 6 km radius were shattered. An initial investigation pointed to human error as the cause of the blast.
The search for survivors is proceeding very slowly because rescuers fear the 30 tons of gunpowder in the factory's underground warehouse might still explode.
Initially the authorities tried to cover up the disaster by setting up roadblocks to prevent reporters from reaching the explosion site and sending armed police to guard the two hospitals treating the injured. There were 12 fatal fireworks factory accidents reported in the official Chinese media last year. But it is suspected that there were dozens of other unreported accidents.
One that did hit the headlines last March was an explosion in Fanglin Village Primary School in Wanzai County in Jiangxi, which left 41 teachers and students dead and 27 injured. It emerged that schoolchildren were making fireworks during their break from classes.
While the authorities never confirmed the allegation, the Prime Minister, Mr Zhu Rongji, admitted the school in question had manufactured fireworks until 1999.
Fireworks manufacturing is a particularly dangerous industry in China with most fireworks put together by hand. Aside from the thousands of legal factories, there is a thriving underground fireworks industry that supports entire regions. In their homes and small workshops, people earn a few yuan weaving strands of fireworks or pouring black powder and chemical colorant into shells. The fireworks are later sent on to larger companies.
The Chinese government has a myriad of safety laws regulating fireworks manufacturing and officially has banned illegal shops. But despite periodic crackdowns, illegal fireworks manufacturing is still a flourishing local cottage industry in impoverished areas.
The fireworks industry in China is big business. China has been making fireworks for over a thousands years and has been the world's largest exporter of them for decades. The huge rise in world demand for fireworks since the beginning of the 1990s is putting even more pressure on an already over-burdened and inadequately-policed industry.
Over the next month or so, fireworks factories all over the country will be working overtime to meet the demand for the Chinese New Year in mid-February. Further accidents are inevitable.
The US imports nearly all its fireworks from China. In 1990, it imported about 24,000 tons of fireworks from China worth nearly $46 million. That figure has doubled in the last decade.
Factories where the fireworks are produced are regularly visited by US inspectors whose sole concern is the safety of the end-product for American consumers. What they are not there to do is compensate the Chinese people who have lost body parts or lives in the increasing number of fatal factory accidents.
Despite expressions of concern by the Chinese leadership after individual tragedies, there is little evidence that a serious crackdown is under way. It seems Beijing is reluctant to come down hard on communities who rely on illegal fireworks operations to make ends meet, afraid that the loss of income might prove a recipe for social instability.
As for the rest of the world, when cartwheels and Roman candles and "bangers" are being lit, a thought should be spared for the thousands of Chinese being maimed and killed by them every year.