Brussels, 31/05/2007 (Agence Europe) - On Thursday 31 May, the European Commission presented customs statistics for the number of counterfeit and pirated articles seized in 2006. The figures demonstrate a significant increase in the amount of counterfeit articles. Fingers are particularly being pointed at India and China.
Customs officials seized more than 250 million such articles in 2006, compared with 75 million in 2005 and 100 million in 2004. With more than 36,000 seizures, the increase is around 40%. It is often difficult to know where the counterfeit goods come from because criminals are using techniques that are increasingly more discreet: transit through several countries, internet sales etc. However, China, India, Malaysia and the United Arab Emirates are some of the countries singled out. China accounts for over
80 % of all articles seized.
More than half of the articles seized in 2006 were cigarettes (156 million packets) - a clear loss to the European economy of at least €460 million. Another trend illustrated by the report is the strong variety of counterfeit products: luxury goods, tea, vodka, children's toys, razor blades etc. More worrying, medicines have shown a dramatic increase in seizures - 2.5 million items compared to 500,000 items in 2005.
As well as the famous Viagra, goods seized include steroids, aspirin, anti-cholesterols, slimming products etc. India and the United Arab Emirates each produce 31% of false medicines, while China produces 20% of them.
At the presentation of these statistics, Laszlo Kovacs, the commissioner for customs called on “all stakeholders to continue to cooperate and take actions at all appropriate levels: business, national customs administrations, police and other enforcement authorities” to implement the law in particular with China and India. This will be done with more cooperation with customs authorities and implementation of customs agreements, as is already the case with China. (gc)