Englands Exports vs Scotland Exports. How the world see us.

Kia Ora!

I was insulted at the weekend, and if you are Scottish you should be insulted too after reading this post.

I had to go to my local Auckland petrol station to grab a new refill of LPG to keep my house warm, when I decided to have a nosey at the official Rugby World Cup Tournament Programme while I waited for the gas. I read on the cover that it contained profiles of all 20 teams, so naturally, I decided to look up the team from my own beloved homeland.

Now I am not the sporty type anyway, so I did not expect to spend more than a few seconds looking at the info in the article, but then I noticed that the good people at whatever office produced this magazine decided to throw in a few non-sports related facts to allow people to get a bit of an idea of the country that team is representing.

I glanced down to the section where it says exports, and for Scotland, it read:
 Wool, Beef, Lamb and Whiskey - Thanks very much.

Fair enough, sounds about right. It obviously doesn't cover everything, but hey, this is a magazine about rugby right? no big deal. But then, I decided to look at the page on England's team. They also had a bit on exports. This is what is says:
Cars, Aircraft Engines, Petroleum, Crude Oil, Pharmaceuticals.

So tell me, as a Scot should I be insulted? Was my reaction warranted by this?

See the images below....

Scottish Exports: Wool, Beef, Lamb and Whiskey

English Exports: Cars, Aircraft Engines, Petroleum, Crude Oil, Pharmaceuticals.

As a regular Scottish guy with a moderate level of understanding of the UK economy, I'd like to state the following. 

England doesn't produce Petrol and Crude Oil. The UK does, and the largest part of this UK industry (90-odd %) is produced by Scotland from Scottish UK waters, not English UK waters. Yet, England is seen this way, by regular people as a mighty economic power, England gets the recognition the entire UK should share in, meanwhile Scotland is seen as a cute attachment to the English dominated UK. We export Whiskey, Wool, Beef and Lamb. 

There is of course no mention of our exported oil and gas (that credit goes to England) no mention of Scottish exported shipbuilding, electronics, metals, textiles, nuclear fuel, wood, food, drink, leather.... the list goes on.

I could dismiss this as simply an inaccurate portrayal of an ignorant New Zealand writer, but I know better. This is a common and inaccurate view taken by many people, English people included.

I apologise if this all sounds like a bitter Scotsman who is having a whinge, but there is a wonderful positive angle to this story and that is this...

This type of international viewpoint reinforces Scotland's position within the global community as a small, cute, unimportant nation. The UK union has done nothing to boost our profile as a modern, industrial, forward looking country. Scotland must fight for her rightful place in the world and take the credit and recognition she deserves as an important part of the European economy. Scotland must fight for full independence as a sovereign nation state within Europe. 

And fight she will.

P.S. as a unionist, I used to get pissed off with the UK flag always being seen as 'England'. Perhaps I should see it the other way round?

Maybe England should be pitied for rarely getting their national flag of St George being shown?