Manufacturing is the creation or
production
Production may refer to:
Economics and business
* Production (economics)
* Production, the act of manufacturing goods
* Production, in the outline of industrial organization, the act of making products (goods and services)
* Production as a stati ...
of
goods
In economics, goods are items that satisfy human wants
and provide utility, for example, to a consumer making a purchase of a satisfying product. A common distinction is made between goods which are transferable, and services, which are not t ...
with the help of
equipment,
labor
Labour or labor may refer to:
* Childbirth, the delivery of a baby
* Labour (human activity), or work
** Manual labour, physical work
** Wage labour, a socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer
** Organized labour and the la ...
,
machines,
tool
A tool is an object that can extend an individual's ability to modify features of the surrounding environment or help them accomplish a particular task. Although many animals use simple tools, only human beings, whose use of stone tools dates ba ...
s, and
chemical
A chemical substance is a form of matter having constant chemical composition and characteristic properties. Some references add that chemical substance cannot be separated into its constituent elements by physical separation methods, i.e., w ...
or
biological processing or
formulation. It is the essence of
secondary sector of the economy. The term may refer to a range of
human activity
Human behavior is the potential and expressed capacity ( mentally, physically, and socially) of human individuals or groups to respond to internal and external stimuli throughout their life. Kagan, Jerome, Marc H. Bornstein, and Richard M. ...
, from
handicraft
A handicraft, sometimes more precisely expressed as artisanal handicraft or handmade, is any of a wide variety of types of work where useful and decorative objects are made completely by one’s hand or by using only simple, non-automated re ...
to
high-tech, but it is most commonly applied to
industrial design, in which
raw materials from the
primary sector
The primary sector of the economy includes any Industry (economics), industry involved in the extraction and production of raw materials, such as farming, logging, fishing, forestry and mining.
The primary sector tends to make up a larger portio ...
are transformed into
finished good
Finished goods are goods that have completed the manufacturing process but have not yet been sold or distributed to the end user.
Manufacturing
Manufacturing has three classes of inventory:
# Raw material
# Work in process
# Finished goods
...
s on a large scale. Such goods may be sold to other manufacturers for the production of other more complex products (such as
aircraft
An aircraft is a vehicle that is able to fly by gaining support from the air. It counters the force of gravity by using either static lift or by using the dynamic lift of an airfoil, or in a few cases the downward thrust from jet engine ...
,
household appliances
A major appliance, also known as a large domestic appliance or large electric appliance or simply a large appliance, large domestic, or large electric, is a non-portable or semi-portable machine used for routine housekeeping tasks such as cookin ...
,
furniture,
sports equipment
Sports equipment, sporting equipment, also called sporting goods, are the tools, materials, apparel, and gear used to compete in a sport and varies depending on the sport. The equipment ranges from balls, nets, and protective gear like helmets. ...
or
automobiles), or distributed via the
tertiary industry
The tertiary sector of the economy, generally known as the service sector, is the third of the three economic sectors in the three-sector model (also known as the economic cycle). The others are the primary sector ( raw materials) and the seco ...
to
end users and
consumer
A consumer is a person or a group who intends to order, or uses purchased goods, products, or services primarily for personal, social, family, household and similar needs, who is not directly related to entrepreneurial or business activities. ...
s (usually through
wholesale
Wholesaling or distributing is the sale of goods or merchandise to retailers; to industrial, commercial, institutional or other professional business users; or to other wholesalers (wholesale businesses) and related subordinated services. In ...
rs, who in turn sell to
retailer
Retail is the sale of goods and Service (economics), services to consumers, in contrast to wholesaling, which is sale to business or institutional customers. A retailer purchases goods in large quantities from manufacturing, manufacturers, dire ...
s, who then sell them to individual
customers).
Manufacturing engineering
Manufacturing engineering or production engineering is a branch of professional engineering that shares many common concepts and ideas with other fields of engineering such as mechanical, chemical, electrical, and industrial engineering.
Manufa ...
is the field of engineering that designs and optimizes the manufacturing process, or the steps through which raw materials are transformed into a
final product
In production, a final product, or finished product is a product that is ready for sale.Wouters, Mark; Selto, Frank H.; Hilton, Ronald W.; Maher, Michael W. (2012): ''Cost Management: Strategies for Business Decisions'', International Edition, ...
. The manufacturing process begins with the
product design, and
materials specification. These materials are then modified through manufacturing to become the desired product.
Modern manufacturing includes all intermediate processes involved in the production and integration of a product's components. Some industries, such as
semiconductor
A semiconductor is a material which has an electrical conductivity value falling between that of a conductor, such as copper, and an insulator, such as glass. Its resistivity falls as its temperature rises; metals behave in the opposite way. ...
and
steel manufacturers, use the term fabrication instead.
The manufacturing sector is closely connected with the
engineering
Engineering is the use of scientific principles to design and build machines, structures, and other items, including bridges, tunnels, roads, vehicles, and buildings. The discipline of engineering encompasses a broad range of more speciali ...
and
industrial design industries.
Etymology
The
Modern English word ''manufacture'' is likely derived from the
Middle French
Middle French (french: moyen français) is a historical division of the French language that covers the period from the 14th to the 16th century. It is a period of transition during which:
* the French language became clearly distinguished from ...
''
manufacture'' ("process of making") which itself originates from the
Classical Latin
Classical Latin is the form of Literary Latin recognized as a literary standard by writers of the late Roman Republic and early Roman Empire. It was used from 75 BC to the 3rd century AD, when it developed into Late Latin. In some later period ...
''
manū'' ("hand") and Middle French ''
facture'' ("making"). Alternatively, the English word may have been independently formed from the earlier English ''manufact'' ("made by human hands") and ''facture''. Its earliest usage in the English language was recorded in the mid-16th century to refer to the making of products by hand.
History and development
Prehistory and ancient history
Human ancestors have manufactured objects using stone and other tools since long before the emergence of ''
Homo sapiens
Humans (''Homo sapiens'') are the most abundant and widespread species of primate, characterized by bipedalism and exceptional cognitive skills due to a large and complex brain. This has enabled the development of advanced tools, culture, ...
'' approximately 200,000 years ago. The earliest methods of
stone tool making, known as the
Oldowan
The Oldowan (or Mode I) was a widespread stone tool archaeological industry (style) in prehistory. These early tools were simple, usually made with one or a few flakes chipped off with another stone. Oldowan tools were used during the Lower ...
"
industry
Industry may refer to:
Economics
* Industry (economics), a generally categorized branch of economic activity
* Industry (manufacturing), a specific branch of economic activity, typically in factories with machinery
* The wider industrial sector ...
", date back to at least 2.3 million years ago, with the earliest direct evidence of tool usage found in
Ethiopia
Ethiopia, , om, Itiyoophiyaa, so, Itoobiya, ti, ኢትዮጵያ, Ítiyop'iya, aa, Itiyoppiya officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country in the Horn of Africa. It shares borders with Eritrea to the ...
within the
Great Rift Valley
The Great Rift Valley is a series of contiguous geographic trenches, approximately in total length, that runs from Lebanon in Asia to Mozambique in Southeast Africa. While the name continues in some usages, it is rarely used in geology as it ...
, dating back to 2.5 million years ago. To manufacture a stone tool, a "
core
Core or cores may refer to:
Science and technology
* Core (anatomy), everything except the appendages
* Core (manufacturing), used in casting and molding
* Core (optical fiber), the signal-carrying portion of an optical fiber
* Core, the centra ...
" of hard stone with specific flaking properties (such as
flint
Flint, occasionally flintstone, is a sedimentary cryptocrystalline form of the mineral quartz, categorized as the variety of chert that occurs in chalk or marly limestone. Flint was widely used historically to make stone tools and sta ...
) was struck with a
hammerstone
In archaeology, a hammerstone is a hard cobble used to strike off lithic flakes from a lump of tool stone during the process of lithic reduction. The hammerstone is a rather universal stone tool which appeared early in most regions of the wo ...
. This flaking produced sharp edges which could be used as tools, primarily in the form of
choppers
Chopper may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
* ''Chopper'' (comics), a horror comic book mini-series
* ''Chopper'' (film), a 2000 Australian film by and about Mark "Chopper" Read
* Chopper (''Judge Dredd''), a character in British comics anth ...
or
scrapers.
These tools greatly aided the early humans in their
hunter-gatherer lifestyle to form other tools out of softer materials such as bone and wood. The
Middle Paleolithic, approximately 300,000 years ago, saw the introduction of the
prepared-core technique, where multiple blades could be rapidly formed from a single core stone.
Pressure flaking
In archaeology, in particular of the Stone Age, lithic reduction is the process of fashioning stones or rocks from their natural state into tools or weapons by removing some parts. It has been intensely studied and many archaeological industri ...
, in which a wood, bone, or antler
punch
Punch commonly refers to:
* Punch (combat), a strike made using the hand closed into a fist
* Punch (drink), a wide assortment of drinks, non-alcoholic or alcoholic, generally containing fruit or fruit juice
Punch may also refer to:
Places
* Pun ...
could be used to shape a stone very finely was developed during the
Upper Paleolithic
The Upper Paleolithic (or Upper Palaeolithic) is the third and last subdivision of the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age. Very broadly, it dates to between 50,000 and 12,000 years ago (the beginning of the Holocene), according to some theories coin ...
, beginning approximately 40,000 years ago. During the
Neolithic
The Neolithic period, or New Stone Age, is an Old World archaeological period and the final division of the Stone Age. It saw the Neolithic Revolution, a wide-ranging set of developments that appear to have arisen independently in several p ...
period, polished
stone tools were manufactured from a variety of hard rocks such as
flint
Flint, occasionally flintstone, is a sedimentary cryptocrystalline form of the mineral quartz, categorized as the variety of chert that occurs in chalk or marly limestone. Flint was widely used historically to make stone tools and sta ...
,
jade,
jadeite, and
greenstone. The polished axes were used alongside other stone tools including
projectiles
A projectile is an object that is propelled by the application of an external force and then moves freely under the influence of gravity and air resistance. Although any objects in motion through space are projectiles, they are commonly found i ...
, knives, and scrapers, as well as tools manufactured from organic materials such as wood, bone, and antler.
Copper
smelting
Smelting is a process of applying heat to ore, to extract a base metal. It is a form of extractive metallurgy. It is used to extract many metals from their ores, including silver, iron, copper, and other base metals. Smelting uses heat and a ...
is believed to have originated when the technology of pottery
kiln
A kiln is a thermally insulated chamber, a type of oven, that produces temperatures sufficient to complete some process, such as hardening, drying, or chemical changes. Kilns have been used for millennia to turn objects made from clay int ...
s allowed sufficiently high temperatures.
The concentration of various elements such as arsenic increase with depth in copper ore deposits and smelting of these ores yields
arsenical bronze
Arsenical bronze is an alloy in which arsenic, as opposed to or in addition to tin or other constituent metals, is combined with copper to make bronze. The use of arsenic with copper, either as the secondary constituent or with another component ...
, which can be sufficiently work hardened to be suitable for manufacturing tools.
Bronze is an alloy of copper with tin; the latter being found in relatively few deposits globally caused a long time to elapse before true tin bronze became widespread. During the
Bronze Age
The Bronze Age is a historic period, lasting approximately from 3300 BC to 1200 BC, characterized by the use of bronze, the presence of writing in some areas, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the second prin ...
, bronze was a major improvement over stone as a material for making tools, both because of its mechanical properties like strength and ductility and because it could be cast in molds to make intricately shaped objects. Bronze significantly advanced shipbuilding technology with better tools and bronze nails, which replaced the old method of attaching boards of the hull with cord woven through drilled holes. The
Iron Age
The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age ( Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age ( Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostl ...
is conventionally defined by the widespread manufacturing of weapons and tools using iron and steel rather than bronze.
[Waldbaum, Jane C. ''From Bronze to Iron''. Gothenburg: Paul Astöms Förlag (1978): 56–58.] Iron smelting is more difficult than tin and copper smelting because smelted iron requires hot-working and can be melted only in specially designed furnaces. The place and time for the discovery of iron smelting is not known, partly because of the difficulty of distinguishing metal extracted from nickel-containing ores from hot-worked meteoritic iron.
During the growth of the ancient civilizations, many ancient technologies resulted from advances in manufacturing. Several of the six classic
simple machines were invented in Mesopotamia. Mesopotamians have been credited with the invention of the
wheel. The
wheel and axle
The wheel and axle is a simple machine consisting of a wheel attached to a smaller axle so that these two parts rotate together in which a force is transferred from one to the other. The wheel and axle can be viewed as a version of the lever, wi ...
mechanism first appeared with the
potter's wheel
In pottery, a potter's wheel is a machine used in the shaping (known as throwing) of clay into round ceramic ware. The wheel may also be used during the process of trimming excess clay from leather-hard dried ware that is stiff but malleable, a ...
, invented in
Mesopotamia
Mesopotamia ''Mesopotamíā''; ar, بِلَاد ٱلرَّافِدَيْن or ; syc, ܐܪܡ ܢܗܪ̈ܝܢ, or , ) is a historical region of Western Asia situated within the Tigris–Euphrates river system, in the northern part of the ...
(modern Iraq) during the 5th millennium BC. Egyptian
paper
Paper is a thin sheet material produced by mechanically or chemically processing cellulose fibres derived from wood, rags, grasses or other vegetable sources in water, draining the water through fine mesh leaving the fibre evenly distrib ...
made from
papyrus
Papyrus ( ) is a material similar to thick paper that was used in ancient times as a writing surface. It was made from the pith of the papyrus plant, '' Cyperus papyrus'', a wetland sedge. ''Papyrus'' (plural: ''papyri'') can also refer to a ...
, as well as
pottery
Pottery is the process and the products of forming vessels and other objects with clay and other ceramic materials, which are fired at high temperatures to give them a hard and durable form. Major types include earthenware, stoneware and ...
, were mass-produced and exported throughout the Mediterranean basin. Early construction techniques used by the Ancient Egyptians made use of bricks composed mainly of clay, sand, silt, and other minerals.
Medieval and early modern
The
Middle Ages
In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire ...
witnessed new inventions, innovations in the ways of managing traditional means of production, and economic growth.
Papermaking, a 2nd-century Chinese technology, was carried to the Middle East when a group of Chinese papermakers were captured in the 8th century. Papermaking technology was spread to Europe by the
Umayyad conquest of Hispania
The Umayyad conquest of Hispania, also known as the Umayyad conquest of the Visigothic Kingdom, was the initial expansion of the Umayyad Caliphate over Hispania (in the Iberian Peninsula) from 711 to 718. The conquest resulted in the decline of t ...
. A paper mill was established in Sicily in the 12th century. In Europe the fiber to make pulp for making paper was obtained from linen and cotton rags.
Lynn Townsend White Jr. credited the spinning wheel with increasing the supply of rags, which led to cheap paper, which was a factor in the development of printing. Due to the casting of cannon, the
blast furnace came into widespread use in France in the mid 15th century. The blast furnace had been used in China since the 4th century BC.
The
stocking frame, which was invented in 1598, increased a knitter's number of knots per minute from 100 to 1000.
First and Second Industrial Revolutions
The
Industrial Revolution
The Industrial Revolution was the transition to new manufacturing processes in Great Britain, continental Europe, and the United States, that occurred during the period from around 1760 to about 1820–1840. This transition included going f ...
was the transition to new manufacturing processes in Europe and the United States from 1760 to the 1830s. This transition included going from
hand production methods to
machines, new
chemical manufacturing and
iron production processes, the increasing use of
steam power and
water power
Hydropower (from el, ὕδωρ, "water"), also known as water power, is the use of falling or fast-running water to produce electricity or to power machines. This is achieved by converting the gravitational potential or kinetic energy of a ...
, the development of
machine tool
A machine tool is a machine for handling or machining metal or other rigid materials, usually by cutting, boring, grinding, shearing, or other forms of deformations. Machine tools employ some sort of tool that does the cutting or shaping. All ...
s and the rise of the
mechanized factory system
The factory system is a method of manufacturing using machinery and division of labor. Because of the high capital cost of machinery and factory buildings, factories are typically privately owned by wealthy individuals or corporations who emplo ...
. The Industrial Revolution also led to an unprecedented rise in the rate of population growth.
Textile
Textile is an umbrella term that includes various fiber-based materials, including fibers, yarns, filaments, threads, different fabric types, etc. At first, the word "textiles" only referred to woven fabrics. However, weaving is not the ...
s were the dominant industry of the Industrial Revolution in terms of employment, value of output and
capital invested. The
textile industry
The textile industry is primarily concerned with the design, production and distribution of yarn, cloth and clothing. The raw material may be natural, or synthetic using products of the chemical industry.
Industry process
Cotton manufacturi ...
was also the first to use modern production methods.
Rapid
industrialization first began in Britain, starting with mechanized spinning in the 1780s,
with high rates of growth in steam power and iron production occurring after 1800.
Mechanized textile production spread from Great Britain to continental Europe and the United States in the early 19th century, with important centres of textiles, iron and
coal
Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock, formed as rock strata called coal seams. Coal is mostly carbon with variable amounts of other elements, chiefly hydrogen, sulfur, oxygen, and nitrogen.
Coal is formed when ...
emerging
in Belgium and the United States and later textiles in France.
An economic recession occurred from the late 1830s to the early 1840s when the adoption of the Industrial Revolution's early innovations, such as mechanized spinning and weaving, slowed down and their markets matured. Innovations developed late in the period, such as the increasing adoption of locomotives, steamboats and steamships,
hot blast iron smelting and new technologies, such as the
electrical telegraph
Electrical telegraphs were point-to-point text messaging systems, primarily used from the 1840s until the late 20th century. It was the first electrical telecommunications system and the most widely used of a number of early messaging systems ...
, were widely introduced in the 1840s and 1850s, were not powerful enough to drive high rates of growth. Rapid economic growth began to occur after 1870, springing from a new group of innovations in what has been called the
Second Industrial Revolution
The Second Industrial Revolution, also known as the Technological Revolution, was a phase of rapid scientific discovery, standardization, mass production and industrialization from the late 19th century into the early 20th century. The Fi ...
. These innovations included new
steel making processes,
mass-production
Mass production, also known as flow production or continuous production, is the production of substantial amounts of standardized products in a constant flow, including and especially on assembly lines. Together with job production and bat ...
,
assembly line
An assembly line is a manufacturing process (often called a ''progressive assembly'') in which parts (usually interchangeable parts) are added as the semi-finished assembly moves from workstation to workstation where the parts are added in se ...
s,
electrical grid systems, the large-scale manufacture of machine tools and the use of increasingly advanced machinery in steam-powered factories.
Building on improvements in vacuum pumps and materials research,
incandescent light bulb
An incandescent light bulb, incandescent lamp or incandescent light globe is an electric light with a wire filament heated until it glows. The filament is enclosed in a glass bulb with a vacuum or inert gas to protect the filament from oxid ...
s became practical for general use in the late 1870s. This invention had a profound effect on the workplace because factories could now have second and third shift workers. Shoe production was mechanized during the mid 19th century. Mass production of
sewing machines and
agricultural machinery
Agricultural machinery relates to the mechanical structures and devices used in farming or other agriculture. There are many types of such equipment, from hand tools and power tools to tractors and the countless kinds of farm implements that ...
such as reapers occurred in the mid to late 19th century.
[.] The mass production of bicycles started in the 1880s.
Steam-powered factories became widespread, although the conversion from water power to steam occurred in England earlier than in the U.S.
Modern manufacturing
Electrification
Electrification is the process of powering by electricity and, in many contexts, the introduction of such power by changing over from an earlier power source.
The broad meaning of the term, such as in the history of technology, economic histor ...
of factories, which had begun gradually in the 1890s after the introduction of the practical
DC motor and the
AC motor
An AC motor is an electric motor driven by an alternating current (AC). The AC motor commonly consists of two basic parts, an outside stator having coils supplied with alternating current to produce a rotating magnetic field, and an inside rotor ...
, was fastest between 1900 and 1930. This was aided by the establishment of electric utilities with central stations and the lowering of electricity prices from 1914 to 1917.
Electric motors allowed more flexibility in manufacturing and required less maintenance than line shafts and belts. Many factories witnessed a 30% increase in output owing to the increasing shift to electric motors. Electrification enabled modern mass production, and the biggest impact of early mass production was in the manufacturing of everyday items, such as at the
Ball Brothers
The Ball brothers (Lucius, William, Edmund, Frank, and George) were five American industrialists and philanthropists who established a manufacturing business in New York and Indiana in the 1880s that was renamed the Ball Corporation in 1969. Th ...
Glass Manufacturing Company, which electrified its
mason jar
A Mason jar, also known as a canning jar or fruit jar, is a glass jar used in home canning to preserve food. It was named after American tinsmith John Landis Mason, who patented it in 1858. The jar's mouth has a screw thread on its outer perime ...
plant in
Muncie, Indiana, U.S. around 1900. The new automated process used glass blowing machines to replace 210 craftsman glass blowers and helpers. A small electric truck was now used to handle 150 dozen bottles at a time whereas previously used hand trucks could only carry 6 dozen bottles at a time. Electric mixers replaced men with shovels handling sand and other ingredients that were fed into the glass furnace. An electric overhead crane replaced 36
day labor
Day labor (or day labour in Commonwealth spelling) is work done where the worker is hired and paid one day at a time, with no promise that more work will be available in the future. It is a form of contingent work.
Types
Day laborers (also ...
ers for moving heavy loads across the factory.
Mass production was popularized in the late 1910s and 1920s by Henry Ford's
Ford Motor Company
Ford Motor Company (commonly known as Ford) is an American multinational automobile manufacturer headquartered in Dearborn, Michigan, United States. It was founded by Henry Ford and incorporated on June 16, 1903. The company sells automobi ...
, which introduced electric motors to the then-well-known technique of chain or sequential production. Ford also bought or designed and built special purpose machine tools and fixtures such as multiple spindle
drill presses
A drill is a tool used for making round holes or driving fasteners. It is fitted with a bit, either a drill or driverchuck. Hand-operated types are dramatically decreasing in popularity and cordless battery-powered ones proliferating due to ...
that could drill every hole on one side of an engine block in one operation and a multiple head
milling machine
Milling is the process of machining using rotary cutters to remove material by advancing a cutter into a workpiece. This may be done by varying direction on one or several axes, cutter head speed, and pressure. Milling covers a wide variety of d ...
that could simultaneously machine 15 engine blocks held on a single fixture. All of these machine tools were arranged systematically in the production flow and some had special carriages for rolling heavy items into machining positions. Production of the
Ford Model T used 32,000 machine tools.
Lean manufacturing (also known as just-in-time manufacturing), was developed in Japan in the 1930s. It is a production method aimed primarily at reducing times within the production system as well as response times from suppliers and to customers.
[Shingo, Shigeo. 1985. ''A Revolution in Manufacturing: The SMED System''. Stamford, Connecticut: Productivity Press] It was introduced in Australia in the 1950s by the British Motor Corporation (Australia) at its Victoria Park plant in Sydney, from where the idea later migrated to Toyota. News spread to western countries from Japan in 1977 in two English-language articles: one referred to the methodology as the "Ohno system", after
Taiichi Ohno
was a Japanese industrial engineer and businessman. He is considered to be the father of the Toyota Production System, which inspired Lean Manufacturing in the U.S. He devised the seven wastes (or muda in Japanese) as part of this system. He ...
, who was instrumental in its development within Toyota. The other article, by Toyota authors in an international journal, provided additional details. Finally, those and other publicity were translated into implementations, beginning in 1980 and then quickly multiplying throughout the industry in the United States and other countries.
Industrial policy
Economics of manufacturing
Emerging technologies have offered new growth methods in advanced manufacturing employment opportunities, for example in the
Manufacturing Belt in the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...
. Manufacturing provides important material support for national
infrastructure and also for
national defense
National security, or national defence, is the security and defence of a sovereign state, including its citizens, economy, and institutions, which is regarded as a duty of government. Originally conceived as protection against military attac ...
.
On the other hand, most manufacturing processes may involve significant social and environmental costs. The clean-up costs of
hazardous waste, for example, may outweigh the benefits of a product that creates it. Hazardous materials may expose
workers
The workforce or labour force is a concept referring to the pool of human beings either in employment or in unemployment. It is generally used to describe those working for a single company or industry, but can also apply to a geographic reg ...
to health risks. These costs are now well known and there is effort to address them by improving
efficiency, reducing waste, using
industrial symbiosis, and eliminating harmful chemicals.
The negative costs of manufacturing can also be addressed legally. Developed countries regulate manufacturing activity with
labor laws
Labour laws (also known as labor laws or employment laws) are those that mediate the relationship between workers, employing entities, trade unions, and the government. Collective labour law relates to the tripartite relationship between employee, ...
and
environmental
A biophysical environment is a biotic and abiotic surrounding of an organism or population, and consequently includes the factors that have an influence in their survival, development, and evolution. A biophysical environment can vary in scale f ...
laws. Across the globe, manufacturers can be subject to regulations and
pollution taxes to offset the
environmental costs of manufacturing activities.
Labor unions
A trade union (labor union in American English), often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers intent on "maintaining or improving the conditions of their employment", ch. I such as attaining better wages and benefits (su ...
and
craft guilds
A guild ( ) is an association of artisans and merchants who oversee the practice of their craft/trade in a particular area. The earliest types of guild formed as organizations of tradesmen belonging to a professional association. They sometimes ...
have played a historic role in the negotiation of worker rights and wages. Environment laws and labor protections that are available in developed nations may not be available in the
third world
The term "Third World" arose during the Cold War to define countries that remained non-aligned with either NATO or the Warsaw Pact. The United States, Canada, Japan, South Korea, Western European nations and their allies represented the " First ...
.
Tort law
A tort is a civil wrong that causes a claimant to suffer loss or harm, resulting in legal liability for the person who commits the tortious act. Tort law can be contrasted with criminal law, which deals with criminal wrongs that are punishabl ...
and
product liability
Product liability is the area of law in which manufacturers, distributors, suppliers, retailers, and others who make products available to the public are held responsible for the injuries those products cause. Although the word "product" has b ...
impose additional costs on manufacturing. These are significant dynamics in the ongoing process, occurring over the last few decades, of manufacture-based industries relocating operations to "developing-world" economies where the costs of production are significantly lower than in "developed-world" economies.
Finance
From a financial perspective, the goal of the manufacturing industry is mainly to achieve
cost benefits per unit produced, which in turn leads to cost reductions in product prices for the market towards
end customers. This relative
cost reduction towards the market, is how manufacturing firms secure their
profit margins.
Safety
Manufacturing has unique health and safety challenges and has been recognized by the
National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH, ) is the United States federal agency responsible for conducting research and making recommendations for the prevention of work-related injury and illness. NIOSH is part of the C ...
(NIOSH) as a priority industry sector in the
National Occupational Research Agenda The National Occupational Research Agenda (NORA) is a partnership program developed by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH). The program was founded in 1996 to provide a framework for research collaborations among univer ...
(NORA) to identify and provide intervention strategies regarding occupational health and safety issues.
Manufacturing and investment
Surveys and analyses of trends and issues in manufacturing and investment around the world focus on such things as:
* The nature and sources of the considerable variations that occur cross-nationally in levels of manufacturing and wider industrial-economic growth;
* Competitiveness; and
* Attractiveness to foreign direct investors.
In addition to general overviews, researchers have examined the features and factors affecting particular key aspects of manufacturing development. They have compared production and investment in a range of Western and non-Western countries and presented case studies of growth and performance in important individual industries and market-economic sectors.
On June 26, 2009,
Jeff Immelt
Jeffrey Robert Immelt (born February 19, 1956) is an American business executive currently working as a venture partner at New Enterprise Associates. He previously served as the CEO of General Electric from 2001 to 2017, and the CEO of GE's Medi ...
, the CEO of General Electric, called for the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...
to increase its manufacturing base employment to 20% of the workforce, commenting that the U.S. has outsourced too much in some areas and can no longer rely on the financial sector and consumer spending to drive demand.
[Bailey, David and Soyoung Kim (June 26, 2009]
GE's Immelt says U.S. economy needs industrial renewal
. ''UK Guardian''. Retrieved on June 28, 2009. Further, while U.S. manufacturing performs well compared to the rest of the U.S. economy, research shows that it performs poorly compared to manufacturing in other high-wage countries. A total of 3.2 million – one in six U.S. manufacturing jobs – have disappeared between 2000 and 2007. In the UK,
EEF the manufacturers organisation Make UK, formerly the Engineering Employers' Federation, represents manufacturers in the United Kingdom.
Purpose
Make UK provides businesses with advice, guidance and support in employment law, employee relations, health, safety, climate and envi ...
has led calls for the UK economy to be rebalanced to rely less on financial services and has actively promoted the manufacturing agenda.
Major manufacturing nations
According to the
United Nations Industrial Development Organization
The United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) (French: Organisation des Nations unies pour le développement industriel; French/Spanish acronym: ONUDI) is a specialized agency of the United Nations that assists countries in ...
(UNIDO),
China is the top manufacturer worldwide by 2019 output, producing 28.7% of the total global manufacturing output, followed by
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...
,
Japan,
Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...
and
India.
UNIDO also publishes a Competitive Industrial Performance (CIP) Index, which measures the competitive manufacturing ability of different nations. The CIP Index combines a nation's gross manufacturing output with other factors like high-tech capability and the nation's impact on the world economy. Germany topped the 2020 CIP Index, followed by China,
South Korea
South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korean Peninsula and sharing a land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed by the Yellow Sea, while its eas ...
, the United States and Japan.
List of countries by manufacturing output
These are the top 50 countries by total value of manufacturing output in US dollars for its noted year according to
World Bank
The World Bank is an international financial institution that provides loans and grants to the governments of low- and middle-income countries for the purpose of pursuing capital projects. The World Bank is the collective name for the Inte ...
.
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See also
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Outline of manufacturing
References
Sources
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External links
How Everyday Things Are Made video presentations
Grant Thornton IBR 2008 Manufacturing industry focus*
ttps://www.nist.gov/el/msid/infotest/digital-thread-manufacturing.cfm Enabling the Digital Thread for Smart ManufacturingEvidences of Metal Manufacturing Historyof the
National Occupational Research Agenda The National Occupational Research Agenda (NORA) is a partnership program developed by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH). The program was founded in 1996 to provide a framework for research collaborations among univer ...
, USA, 2018.
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