What is wrong with Western manufacturers?

Is it possible to acquire the inputs of production? I think there is a general assumption that if you can afford to pay for a thing and it is legal to own, that you can buy it. However outside the general sphere of consumer-goods this is not the case in the West.

I've been wanting to work on a project involving tissue plastination. The goto company for plastination is Biodur, which is based in Germany (oh no...). They will not even ship to you unless you can show that you have an institutional address. But that's okay! Some Brazilian scientists proved that Biodur's "proprietary process" is just a mixture of low molecular weight silicone and a few other things. I checked a number of sellers for these materials based in Germany, the UK, and Canada. They all had me fill out a long form only to tell me I'm not an institution and they won't ship to me.

So I do what I should have done in the first place and email a Chinese company (in this case Nanjing SiSiB). They get back to me the same day and are happy to send me small amounts for 1/4 of the price of Western companies. I've had similar experiences with other companies in China and India.

This is what it's like for fucking everything today.