Q1.
Ask your nearest retailer about a product, its place of origin, and the chain of suppliers in the process of the product reaching the shop. Trace this using a flow chart like Fig. 12.11 and share it in class.
Answer
Method — four steps.
- Choose a product with a clear origin. A packet of tea, a bar of soap, a bag of rice, a school notebook or a mobile charger works better than a loose vegetable, because the packet itself prints the manufacturer's name and address.
- Ask the shopkeeper five questions and write the answers down: Who delivers this to you — a company van, a distributor, or do you fetch it from the wholesale market? Where is that wholesale market? Who makes it, and where? How often does the stock come? Does the price you pay change during the year?
- Read the label for the manufacturer's name and address and the date of manufacture. That gives you the far end of the chain even if the shopkeeper does not know it.
- Draw the flow chart in the shape of Fig. 12.11 — one box per link, one arrow per movement, and write on each arrow who moves the goods.
What a good answer must contain: at least four named links; the real place at each link, not just the word “factory”; the arrow labels (“purchased by”, “sent to”, “delivered by”); and one sentence on what would break if that link disappeared.
Sample answer: “I asked Suresh bhaiya at the grocery shop about a 1 kg packet of tea.
Tea gardens, Jorhat district, Assam → leaves auctioned at → Guwahati Tea Auction Centre → bought in bulk by → the blending and packing factory of the company, near Kolkata → despatched by truck to → the company's distributor in our district headquarters → whose van delivers every Thursday to → Suresh bhaiya's shop → sold in 250 g and 1 kg packets to → our family.
He said the distributor's van is the link that matters most to him — when it did not come during the monsoon floods last year, he had no tea to sell for nine days even though the factory had plenty in stock.”
Tea gardens, Jorhat district, Assam → leaves auctioned at → Guwahati Tea Auction Centre → bought in bulk by → the blending and packing factory of the company, near Kolkata → despatched by truck to → the company's distributor in our district headquarters → whose van delivers every Thursday to → Suresh bhaiya's shop → sold in 250 g and 1 kg packets to → our family.
He said the distributor's van is the link that matters most to him — when it did not come during the monsoon floods last year, he had no tea to sell for nine days even though the factory had plenty in stock.”