Nghe An: The arduous fight against counterfeit goods and trade fraud

(Baonghean) - With its location on the North-South national highway with seaports and border with Laos, Nghe An has favorable conditions to promote trade and develop economy, commerce, services, and freight transport. However, that is also an opportunity for the situation of trading and transporting prohibited, smuggled, and counterfeit goods to become more complicated with increasingly sophisticated methods and tricks.

Counterfeit goods are still rampant

Nghe An has 11,868 enterprises and 143,479 business households, along with a widely developed commercial infrastructure network with a diverse and abundant volume of goods in circulation. In recent years, Nghe An is no longer a hot spot for smuggling in the country as before, but with the market mechanism, counterfeit goods still pose many complex risks.

Right on Quang Trung Street (Vinh City), entering an electronics store, we easily encountered counterfeit products. That is a Panasonis hair dryer - counterfeiting the Panasonic brand sold for 150,000 VND; a TCSHLBA rice cooker counterfeiting the Toshiba rice cooker - sold for 120,000 VND... The store owner did not hide that these products are made in China, we sell to low-income people such as workers, students renting rooms.

Smuggled cosmetics seized by Market Management force. Photo: Tung Chi

Not only electronics, counterfeit goods are quite common in cosmetic products, and more dangerously, even traditional medicine and modern medicine are counterfeited. Violations in the production and trading of counterfeit goods are mainly manual production, mixing, repackaging, changing the packaging and labels of famous brands to put on the market to deceive consumers for profit.

Commercial fraud is challenging the authorities. Smuggling, commercial fraud, and counterfeit goods not only cause budget losses, weaken the economy, and give rise to corruption, but also affect people's health. Although state management agencies have actively participated, counterfeit goods, fake goods, poor quality goods, and goods that do not ensure food safety and hygiene are still a concern for consumers.

What is the solution?

In performing its assigned functions and tasks, the Department of Industry and Trade has directed the Market Management Department - Standing Agency of the Provincial Steering Committee 389 (Steering Committee against smuggling, counterfeit goods and trade fraud) to advise the Provincial People's Committee to promptly issue and deploy plans and directive documents for implementation.

At the same time, the Department has directed the Market Management Department to proactively develop and sign regulations on coordination with the Provincial Police, Border Guard, Customs Department, Department of Standards, Metrology and Quality, Department of Food Safety and Hygiene... to develop plans and conduct regular inspections and specialized inspections according to regulations, organize peak periods of market inspection and control, fight against smuggling, trade fraud, counterfeit goods... 21 districts, cities and towns have established local Steering Committee 389.

Authorities destroy counterfeit and smuggled goods. Photo: Tung Chi

However, in addition to the achieved results, the market inspection and control work of the market management force still has some shortcomings and limitations. The management of the area and business entities is not strict and comprehensive, sometimes it is not timely to grasp information and grasp the situation to advise the authorities to take measures to handle it.

The production and trading of counterfeit goods, poor quality goods, goods of unknown origin, banned goods, smuggled goods, and food safety violations still occur in the market. State management of prices still has many shortcomings: price declaration and registration have not been carried out regularly by enterprises; price posting in many places is still a formality and a coping measure; selling at the wrong listed price, especially at markets and tourist attractions. The work of consolidating forces is still slow compared to the requirements.

In particular, although the number of inspections is large, they mainly stop at the form of administrative sanctions, the number of large cases transferred to the investigation agency for criminal prosecution is not large, so the deterrent effect on violators is not high. In addition, public opinion also raises the question of where the role and responsibility of the Market Management Agency is when a number of projects related to petroleum trading are discovered and handled by the Department of Science and Technology inspectors. That is the project to destroy the fake IC production line to cheat on petroleum (in 2014) and recently the project to discover 20 enterprises and petroleum stores mixing and trading "dirty" gasoline. Because there are loopholes in the management of quality and petroleum trading, the acts of trading "dirty" gasoline and fraudulent measurement continue to infiltrate the market.

Counterfeit Toshiba rice cookers sold on Quang Trung street, Vinh city. Photo: Tung Chi

Mr. Nguyen Van Thang - Deputy Head of the Provincial Market Management Department said: "Although the fight against counterfeit goods has been carried out vigorously, there are still shortcomings. In particular, the prominent cause is due to the lack of synchronization of resources, enforcement mechanisms as well as coordination between relevant agencies and departments, with overlapping functions and tasks. In addition, technical means for the fight against counterfeit goods, means of appraisal, and distinguishing genuine and counterfeit goods, are still lacking and weak...".

From that reality, to combat counterfeit goods, Mr. Hoang Van Tam - Director of the Department of Industry and Trade said that in the coming time, it is necessary to continue to strictly implement Resolution No. 41/NQ-CP of the Government on promoting the fight against smuggling, trade fraud and counterfeit goods in the new situation; Perfecting the legal system and policies on market inspection and control; Clearly defining the responsibilities and tasks of sectors, forces, organizations and local authorities in market management to assign and decentralize a number of tasks; Establishing a number of interdisciplinary inspection teams to strengthen market inspection and control for key industries such as: Gasoline, liquefied petroleum gas, fertilizers, pesticides, medicines, cosmetics, functional foods, quality management of agricultural, forestry and fishery products, food hygiene and safety... Along with that, increasing investment attraction to develop production, business and trade infrastructure;

For inspection forces such as the Market Management Department - Standing Agency of the Provincial Steering Committee 389, it is necessary to strengthen coordination with inspection forces, handle violations in accordance with regulations, focus on effectively implementing the coordination regulations signed with the Provincial Police, Customs Department, Provincial Border Guard Command, Forestry Department to improve the effectiveness in the fight against smuggling, production and trading of counterfeit goods and trade fraud in the area...

The fight against counterfeit goods, fake goods, intellectual property infringement goods, and poor quality goods is extremely difficult and complicated, requiring the responsibility of not only market management agencies but also the participation of the whole society, including consumers.

Tung Chi