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24.
The above chart shows the electricity consumption in five countries in 1999 and 2003. Of the five countries, the United States consumed the greatest amount of electricity in both 1999 and 2003. China and Japan consumed the same amount of electricity in 1999, but four years later China’s consumption increased by more than 500 billion kilowatt-hours while Japan's remained unchanged. The increase in China’s electricity consumption was the second largest among the five countries. India’s consumption increased to slightly over 500 billion kilowatt-hours in 2003, but Brazil's remained below 500 billion kilowatt-hours.

25.
The United States remains an underdeveloped country when it comes to language skills. Immigrants are importing their mother tongues at record rates. Yet the vast majority of Americans remain stubbornly monolingual. Ignorance of other languages and cultures handicaps the United States in dealing with the rest of the world. Today the language policies in the United States address this problem primarily with efforts to teach “foreign” languages to monolingual Americans. Meanwhile, the United States seeks to eliminate these same skills among ethnic minorities by reducing existing bilingual programs, out of misplaced fears of diversity or haste to force their assimilation. Instead of focusing on immigrants’ disabilities in English, why not encourage them to maintain their abilities in their mother tongues while they learn English?

26.
The introduction of unique products alone does not guarantee market success. Another vital factor is increasing one’s responsiveness to the markets by providing products suited for the local communities that make up the market. This means understanding that each country, community and individual has unique characteristics and needs; it requires sensitivity to regional and individual differences. In other words, one of the challenges is to avoid a one-size-fits-all strategy that places too much emphasis on the “global” aspect alone. Even categorizing countries as “developed” or “emerging” is dangerous. Upon closer analysis, “emerging” countries are not only vastly different from one another, they are also composed of numerous unique individuals and communities.