Passage 2
Nike is the world's largest supplier of athletic footwear and among the most successful consumer-products companies to have emerged in the past 20 years. Part of that success has come about by paying rock-bottom wages to the workers who make the shoes. All but 1% of the 90 million shoes Nike makes each year are manufactured in Asia.
Nike is as American as Coca-cola. Part of its appeal to the millions of people around the world who buy its athletic shoes is that Nike is selling a sense of freedom. "Just do it!"exult Nike's advertisements.
But there is a rough side to this dream: the ruthlessness with which Nike pares its costs. The company is for ever on the look-out for cheap production sites. If costs in a particular country or factory move too far out of line, productivity will have to rise to compensate, or Nike will take its business elsewhere. The firm uses about 40 factories; 20 have closed in the past five years or so another 35 have opened.
Nike may look like an all-American enterprise but its success relies on its ability to harness Asia's spectacular manufacturing expertise. "We're always looking for new manufacturing sources, says Nike's vice-president for production. "People ask why we don't produce more in Eastern Europe, but we've concluded that the most capable manutacturers are in Asia".
The organization of Nike is simple and effective. All the production risk is taken by contractors.We dont' know the first thing about manufacturing," says Nike's' vice-president for Asia-Pacific. "We are marketers and designers. "There are the areas on which it concentrates its resources. Yet it retains the advantages of firms which produce in-house, namely a high degree of control over quality and the ability to respond rapidly to changing tastes.
Until recently, almost all Nike's shoes were made in South Korea and Taiwan, but as labor costs there have soared, the firm's contractors in these two areas have moved much of their production to cheaper sites in Indonesia and Thailand.
Statements:
50.Nike prefers to produce in Asia rather than in Eastern Europe because they think the Asian market is bigger than Eastern Europe's.
A、True
B、False
【正确答案】：B
【名师解析】:Nike选择在亚洲而非东欧生产的主要原因是他们认为亚洲的制造商具有更高的制造能力，而不是因为亚洲市场比东欧市场更大。根据文中Nike副总裁的说法，他们一直在寻找新的制造来源，但得出的结论是亚洲拥有最有能力的生产制造商。这表明，Nike的决策是基于生产能力和效率，而不是市场规模。因此，题目中的陈述是错误的。
