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Technology Stocks : Discuss Year 2000 Issues -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: David Eddy who wrote (5133)	4/5/1999 9:22:00 AM
From: flatsville	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 9818

Dave--Re: the 80% of "basic chemicals" or whatever coming from abroad...Here is the problem with dismissing this figure out of hand as an urban legend/myth...While the Dept. of Commerce figures as published C&EN indicates that the dollar figures for medicinals and pharmaceuticals are more more like 50/50 import/export with a clear trend towards increasing imports, the tonnage figures for specific actives and excipients might tell a completely different story. For example there is an active ingredient used in impotency research from abroad that while very expensive and skews dollar data it has little affect on tonnage data. In an true emergency where shipping and manufacturing abroad were disrupted it would not be missed except by those few companies engaged in impotency research (and some really hopeful guys who can't take Viagra?) If access to critical active or excipients "ingredients" widely used in common prescription meds suddenly became restricted..well, this would be an entirely different matter. Bear in mind that quite a bit of chemical manufacturing has moved abroad due to environmental concerns here in the US. And as we have seen there are some pretty odd niche chemical manufacturing situations which could affect certain sectors. Consider this unusual chemical manufacturing situation: y2ktoday.com The problem is compounded by modern manufacturing, management and marketing techniques that rely on just-in-time inventories, international distribution systems and single source suppliers to compete in a global economy. Consider, for example, that gum rosin plants within China supply a majority of the raw material required for polymers used in a variety of inks and coatings. This is the basis for a domino effect that is unprecedented in our modern economy and one of reasons that Year 2000 promises to be the greatest wealth transfer event of the 20th century. The CIA didn't recently organized a standing committee to monitor the chemical manufacturing situation for no reason. I'll dismiss the 80% figure when the tonnage data fails to bear out.