Madrid, Spain:
One in just about every 10 Europeans has been duped into getting counterfeit solutions, mainly coming from Asia, a study by the EU’s intellectual house workplace (EUIPO) showed Tuesday.
Many buyers struggle to differentiate among genuine solutions and fakes, mentioned the study by EUIPO which is based in the Spanish coastal city of Alicante.
Counterfeit solutions account for 6.8 % of the European Union’s imports and are worth 121 billion euros ($147 billion) according to figures from EUIPO and the Paris-based Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development(OECD).
Counterfeits are present in all sectors from clothes to electronics, toys and wine, with 9. % of European “admitting they had been duped into making such a purchase,” the study located.
But the percentage varies broadly by nation, with 12 % in Spain, 9 % in France, 19 % in Bulgaria and 2 % in Switzerland.
In a context exactly where e-commerce is booming globally due to the pandemic, in which 70 % of Europeans shopped on-line last year, Eurostat figures show, “the ability to identify counterfeit products remains problematic for EU citizens”, the study says.
EUIPO says 33 % of Europeans “have already wondered about the authenticity of a product they’ve bought”.
EUIPO head Christian Archambeau also flagged the “rise in the number of counterfeit medications and healthcare products which can have adverse effects on people’s health and safety”.
According to yet another EUIPO study published earlier this year, the major nations of origin for counterfeit medicines are China and India, though the United Arab Emirates, Hong Kong and Singapore serve as “transit hubs” for such solutions, whose international worth in March 2020 amounted to $5 million.
Such solutions, which include things like every little thing from painkillers to antibiotics and even face masks, are largely destined for Africa, the United States and Europe, but also Albania, Ukraine and Morocco.
They are mainly transported by ship, with “80 percent of the global value of containers seized worldwide” originating from China and Hong Kong, the EUIPO study mentioned.
It also drew interest to the “lucrative” piracy of tv content that is accessed on-line, which in the EU is worth more than $1 billion just about every year, with the resulting effect felt by content creators and reputable organizations.
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