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Manufacturing hideouts for fake products
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It not only violates the intellectual property rights of manufacturers, it also puts consumers in serious danger. Dangers range from ingestion of fake pharmaceuticals to accidents caused by substandard parts.
China is a culprit. It engages in unfair trade practices, including wholesale counterfeiting of U.S. products. It has huge factories dedicated to making products that look exactly like U.S. brand name goods. This Chinese criminal practice is not limited to business relations with the United States. World wide, China is a problem to economies. Tonnes of Chinese products, sub-standard products dominate markets.
Stories are told of Nigerians who approach factories in China to manufacture fake products for them. We hear they take the originals of these products to Chinese manufacturers and instruct them to counterfeit them.
When products are counterfeited, they cause job losses in countries where the counterfeited products are brought into. Counterfeited textile products imported into Nigeria, have caused job losses in the country's textile factories that are already reeling in pains, brought about by a litany of other factors.
Intellectual property theft affects the nation's movie, music and books industries with owners of vides, DVDs,CDs and books losing billions of naira to unrepentant pirates of their products.
Reports have it that in his recent study of fake pharmaceuticals, Paul Newton of Oxford University found a disturbing amount of fake malaria drugs sold in Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam and disappointedly concluded, "...about half of the Artesunate contained no active ingredient. So, logically, if malaria is a public health problem in Southeast Asia and is potentially fatal, if people are taking these drugs that contain starch and chalk, they are very unlikely to survive their malaria infection."
Said she: "In one shop, a hundred thousand fake artesunate were offered for sale. So, they are not being produced in somebody's kitchen. They are produced on an industrial scale. And if organized crime is involved, which seems very likely, then that makes it much harder to do anything about."
Dora Akunyili, director general of National aAministration for Food, Drugs Administration and Control (NAFDAC), has put her life on the line fighting peddlers of counterfeit drugs in the country.
She lamented in one of her outings:" The problem of counterfeit drugs and other regulated products is rapidly rearing its ugly head in developed countries and this is fueled by purchase of drugs via the internet. The negative impact of counterfeit drugs and other regulated products knows no boundaries. Resistant strains of micro-organisms do not need visa to travel from country to country."
Agreed that product counterfeiting is a global crime, perfected by the likes of China and other Asian tigers, smart Nigerians have learnt the trade from them. If NAFDAC thinks it is only in Onitsha, Lagos and some other cities in Nigeria that manufacturers and sellers of counterfeit products exist, I beg to argue that Akunyili's tough and hardworking NAFDAC is wrong.
Let NAFDAC be informed that in the hinterland of Ondo State, close to a prime town in Akoko North East Local Government, there exists a cottage factory where La Casera and Viju milk and some popular 'hot' drinks are counterfeited.
These products, according to my source, are expertly packaged, sold in Ondo State, and some are even moved to markets in Lagos! Certified manufacturers of these products need to step up their market intelligence network. There are likely to be more manufacturing hideouts across the country.
China is a culprit. It engages in unfair trade practices, including wholesale counterfeiting of U.S. products. It has huge factories dedicated to making products that look exactly like U.S. brand name goods. This Chinese criminal practice is not limited to business relations with the United States. World wide, China is a problem to economies. Tonnes of Chinese products, sub-standard products dominate markets.
Stories are told of Nigerians who approach factories in China to manufacture fake products for them. We hear they take the originals of these products to Chinese manufacturers and instruct them to counterfeit them.
When products are counterfeited, they cause job losses in countries where the counterfeited products are brought into. Counterfeited textile products imported into Nigeria, have caused job losses in the country's textile factories that are already reeling in pains, brought about by a litany of other factors.
Intellectual property theft affects the nation's movie, music and books industries with owners of vides, DVDs,CDs and books losing billions of naira to unrepentant pirates of their products.
Reports have it that in his recent study of fake pharmaceuticals, Paul Newton of Oxford University found a disturbing amount of fake malaria drugs sold in Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam and disappointedly concluded, "...about half of the Artesunate contained no active ingredient. So, logically, if malaria is a public health problem in Southeast Asia and is potentially fatal, if people are taking these drugs that contain starch and chalk, they are very unlikely to survive their malaria infection."
Said she: "In one shop, a hundred thousand fake artesunate were offered for sale. So, they are not being produced in somebody's kitchen. They are produced on an industrial scale. And if organized crime is involved, which seems very likely, then that makes it much harder to do anything about."
Dora Akunyili, director general of National aAministration for Food, Drugs Administration and Control (NAFDAC), has put her life on the line fighting peddlers of counterfeit drugs in the country.
She lamented in one of her outings:" The problem of counterfeit drugs and other regulated products is rapidly rearing its ugly head in developed countries and this is fueled by purchase of drugs via the internet. The negative impact of counterfeit drugs and other regulated products knows no boundaries. Resistant strains of micro-organisms do not need visa to travel from country to country."
Agreed that product counterfeiting is a global crime, perfected by the likes of China and other Asian tigers, smart Nigerians have learnt the trade from them. If NAFDAC thinks it is only in Onitsha, Lagos and some other cities in Nigeria that manufacturers and sellers of counterfeit products exist, I beg to argue that Akunyili's tough and hardworking NAFDAC is wrong.
Let NAFDAC be informed that in the hinterland of Ondo State, close to a prime town in Akoko North East Local Government, there exists a cottage factory where La Casera and Viju milk and some popular 'hot' drinks are counterfeited.
These products, according to my source, are expertly packaged, sold in Ondo State, and some are even moved to markets in Lagos! Certified manufacturers of these products need to step up their market intelligence network. There are likely to be more manufacturing hideouts across the country.
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