Throughout English history, trying hard to keep the price of bread low and keep its quality good, the government made repeated efforts to prevent dishonesty and corruption in the baking industry. Records show in 1298 many bakers were given heavy fines for selling short weights of bread, and in 1327 a fraud was discovered where the public bakers were pinching quantities of the dough that their customers brought in to have baked.

Punishments were rather severe, including the offenders being dragged through the streets and pilloried, or just put out of business. In ancient Egypt, the punishment could be even worse. There dishonest bakers often had their ears nailed to their bakery door. The restrictions and punishments were so draconian that the bakers themselves took steps to ensure that they provoked no claims against them.

Bakers' honesty did not stem from their kind nature, but from their fear of harsh punishment.

Another telling illustration is Singapore, a tiny country often called a "nanny state" because of its strict laws such as caning and the ban on chewing gum. The high level of civility and orderliness is the result of a long-time exercise of policy of carrots and sticks.

The same was true of ancient China. We all have read stories of households' doors being left open at night and gold left on the road remaining untouched. But that was not the whole picture. Over various dynasties, rigorous laws, many of which seemed cruel to us today, were adopted to prevent offenses and to punish the culprits.

When all of us live in constant fear of ubiquitous toxic substance in our food, assuming it impossible to get away from the specter, one fact can reveal how easily this could be fixed. The State Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine recently told the media that over the past 11 years the food exported from the mainland to Hong Kong was 99.97 percent safe and that to Macau, 100 percent safe.

Again, it is not that suppliers for Hong Kong and Macau markets are more reliable than those for the mainland markets, but that the former must go through a stringent inspection process before they can ship their products to those two places.

Any violation will result in an immediate revocation of their export certificate. In the past 11 years, only one company, exporting live chickens, was given this punishment. No one would risk taking a chance in the face of the no-nonsense rule.

So, the only way to make businessmen honest is to watch them closely with a stick held high. It's not enough to talk about morality. Only after many years of the strict enforcement of laws can moral sense begin to take root in businessmen.