Counterfeit goods, smuggling named key problems for CU light industry

MOSCOW, 22 October (BelTA) - The problem of smuggled and counterfeit light industry products is a crucial one for the development of the light industry in the Customs Union (CU). The statement was made at the first session of an expert group of the Advisory Committee for Industry under the Eurasian Economic Commission (EEC) and the working subgroup “Light and textile industry” responsible for introducing new technologies, BelTA learnt from the press service of the EEC.

The volume of the market of light industry products in the CU and the EEC is estimated at $41.8 billion. The share of products made in the CU and the EEC is only 28% (of which 3% is export to third countries), legal import equals about 43% and unaccounted export about 29%.

The session pointed out the need to introduce a joint action plan for the CU and EEC members to develop the light industry and specify measures to support the sector in part of customs, tariff and non-tariff regulation in order to supply it with raw materials and maintain competitiveness of producers of ready-made goods. Experts also deem it necessary to label light industry products in order to control their circulation on the CU customs territory in terms of producer's costs. They also stress the need to combat smuggling and import of counterfeit products and introduce mechanisms to improve the quality of light industry products, including by means of developing a system of voluntary certification.

The session participants were updated on the suggestions received by the EEC concerning modern mechanisms of labeling light industry products by means of the radio-frequency identification technology (RFID) which makes it possible to confirm the legality of import and make sure that light industry products have not been counterfeited. These suggestions are the result of joint research made by Belarusian and Russian R&D organizations, the Inter-branch Scientific and Practical Center for Identification Systems and E-business Operations of the National Academy of Sciences of Belarus and Russia’s RST-Invent company which is a joint venture of Russian Corporation of Nanotechnologies (RUSNANO) and Systematic Group, one of the largest Russian system integrators.