Need a synchronized solution

(Baonghean) -With the desire to grasp the situation of law enforcement in the fight against smuggling, counterfeit goods, poor quality goods and trade fraud in the province, recently, the Legal Committee of the Provincial People's Council organized a supervision of the fight against smuggling, counterfeit goods and trade fraud in a number of units. Thereby, a number of difficulties were highlighted...

According to Mr. Nguyen Van Huy - Chairman of the Provincial Fatherland Front Committee, the standing agency of the Campaign "Vietnamese people prioritize using Vietnamese goods" in Nghe An province, counterfeit goods, fake goods, poor quality goods, goods of unknown origin are flooding the market, becoming an "undercurrent" affecting people's health and social security, causing public outrage. According to Mr. Tran Dang Ninh - Head of the Provincial Market Management Department, in our province, there have not been any large production "nests" or "groups" where counterfeit goods, fake goods, poor quality goods are mainly transported from other localities or smuggled from abroad.

Currently, the authorities have also discovered a number of establishments that manually manufacture counterfeit goods of some large branded companies to bring to the market. Meanwhile, the control of counterfeit and poor quality goods by the authorities is still limited. The problem is still considered "eternal" due to the thin force, large area, diverse and abundant goods; equipment for the work is still lacking and weak. The Market Management Department is the unit with the function of inspecting and controlling the market, fighting against smuggling, banned goods, and counterfeit goods in the whole province, but the total number of cadres, civil servants and workers in the entire force is only 110 people.

In addition, there are no tools to identify counterfeit and poor quality goods, so if we check by “sensory” to confirm whether a certain item is counterfeit or poor quality, there is no basis. To determine the quality of a certain item, we have to send samples to Hanoi for testing, which costs a lot of money and takes a long time, making it difficult for authorities to fight against counterfeit and poor quality goods. On the other hand, legitimate manufacturing and trading enterprises themselves have not yet taken responsibility to protect their products and protect their own business interests.

The Provincial People's Council Legal Committee and the Provincial Market Management Department supervise the quality of goods at Vinh City Trade Center.

Mr. Chu Quang Luan - Director of Nghe An Customs Department said: "Although there are regulations that enterprises have the right to send documents requesting competent authorities to conduct intellectual property supervision of their products, enterprises have not paid attention to that. Recently, through customs procedures, we discovered 2 counterfeit goods, and informed the enterprises to determine whether the products of these 2 enterprises were infringed on intellectual property, but both enterprises did not respond and cooperate. Therefore, Customs has no basis to recall and destroy the products. On the consumer side, some are not "strong enough" to recognize counterfeit, fake, and poor quality goods (due to being too sophisticated), some are too easy-going in shopping, some have the mentality of buying cheap..., all of them are inadvertently "helping" the trade of counterfeit, fake, and poor quality goods to develop".

To limit counterfeit, fake and poor quality goods, first of all, three factors are needed: people, means (machines, measuring equipment, identifying counterfeit and poor quality goods), and funding. In addition, it is necessary to focus on raising awareness among consumers, thereby moving towards "boycotting" counterfeit and poor quality goods; strengthening coordination between levels and functional sectors because if each sector acts alone, it is difficult to implement well. An equally important solution is the role of enterprises. Enterprises must not be lax in managing and monitoring the consumption of their goods through the implementation of intellectual property rights before law enforcement agencies, and at the same time provide consumers with information to distinguish genuine goods of enterprises from counterfeit, fake and poor quality goods. The fight against counterfeiting should not be considered the responsibility of law enforcement agencies.

The fight against counterfeit, fake and poor quality goods is a task that requires the whole society to join hands. With the responsibility of an elected body, on the basis of listening to the thoughts, reflections and recommendations of voters, the Legal Committee of the Provincial People's Council has recently organized a monitoring session on the fight against smuggling, counterfeit and poor quality goods and trade fraud in a number of sectors and localities in the province. Through the monitoring, the Legal Committee has recorded the shortcomings, difficulties and obstacles in this work of the forces; on that basis, it is recommending the Provincial People's Council to consider and decide on a number of contents that are being raised in practice at the upcoming session in order to put this work into order and protect the rights of consumers in the province.

Article and photos: Minh Chi