JEDDAH, 3 October 2005 — They often look the same but counterfeit products range from simply being inferior to the original to downright deadly.
Perfumes, medicines, food products, electronic devices and even car tires may not be what they seem to be, and consumers may be getting less than they paid for.
Unilever, MBC and Panorama have launched a campaign to combat counterfeit products and improve the marketplace for consumers.
Manufacturers of cheap, “knockoff” products have found ways to flood the Kingdom’s shops and markets with unregulated, unhealthy, and very possibly dangerous products. With these unregulated products, preventive measures taken for the safety of the consumer disappear, leaving men, women and children at risk.
The broadcast campaign aims to raise awareness, stop the flow of phony products and protect the copyrights and trademarks of legitimate businesses.
Amr Dabbagh, head of the Saudi Arabia’s General Investment Authority and a prominent businessman, told an investment magazine that the campaign was an important start of the nation’s offensive against knockoff products as the Kingdom gears up to enter the World Trade Organization (WTO).
The campaign began on June 9. Its 30-second public service announcements provide tips on spotting and avoiding phony products. In addition, the campaign explains the hazards of the cheap knockoffs to both the consumer and the national economy.
A representative of the Anti-Fraud Committee in the Riyadh Chamber of Commerce and Industry (RCCI) expressed similar concerns about commercial fraud saying that the Kingdom and businesses within Saudi Arabia lose millions of riyals every year because of knockoffs - money that could benefit the economy and in turn the people of Saudi Arabia.
Most of the time people are unaware of the fact that they are being duped by marketers who make their phony products look exactly like the real ones. Consumers who are aware are often indifferent, citing product price as their primary concern.
“I know that this bottle of vitamins isn’t original,” said a young woman as she popped a vitamin into her mouth. “But I don’t think they can be any different. I mean it is a vitamin pill; it can’t be that harmful.”
Provided, of course, that it is indeed a vitamin pill. Sources said that a raid on a factory netted 5,000 crates of counterfeit painkillers. Despite packaging identical to the genuine product and pills that appeared the same, chemical analysis revealed the tablets were 80 percent chalk.
In some cases, deaths and sometimes irreversible side effects also have been reported.
To avoid knockoffs, experts advise that labels and spellings of words be carefully checked before purchasing a product. If a price sounds too good to be true, it may well be too good to be true. In other words, what seems to be a real bargain may be less than you bargained for and anything but real.
For more information and tips on spotting counterfeited products tune to MBC-FM and Panorama on the hour from 7-9 a.m. and 5-7 p.m. weekdays. On weekends, the announcements run on the hour from 5-8 p.m.
