Kenya signs deal with China to curb counterfeits

Kenya has signed a contract with China to vet the quality of goods originating from the Asian nation, raising hope in the fight against sub-standard products flooding the domestic market.

The pact will see export products targeted at the Kenyan market tested for quality by the giant China Certification and Inspections Group (CCIC) on behalf of the Chinese national standards regulator.

“The deal targets to lock out low quality products, some of which may be counterfeits,” Eva Oduor, the managing director of the Kenya Bureau of Standards (Kebs) said.

She said the move follows a memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed in 2005 between President Kibaki and the Chinese government to help fight sub-standard goods entering the country.

“We have moved to make the agreement operational so that China can help monitor all the goods leaving her market for Kenya. Our officers in Kenya will also get technical training on how to monitor goods from China,” Mrs Oduor said.

Following the deal, Kebs will recognise conformity assessment processes undertaken and certificates issued by CCIC for Chinese products.

The Chinese inspection firm already has such agreements with several countries around the world as well as individual multinational companies such as Shell, BP, Dell, HP, Phillips, Mercedes, BMW and Canon to check the flow of counterfeits.

Analysts said the deal portends relief for the government and local manufacturers grappling with the proliferation of counterfeits as illegal goods eat up market share and cause loss of revenue for the government.

“Some of the lower quality products that are chocking our market are from China and if that is stopped fast we will have some fairness in competition,” Kareem Patel, a textile dealer in Nairobi said.

Kenya has in the recent years witnessed an upsurge in the volume of Chinese goods entering its domestic market, thanks to lower prices compared to imports from other source markets such as US and UK.

Data show that Kenya mainly exports leather, tea, coffee, sisal fibre, scrap metal and horticulture to China and in turn takes up machinery, electronic and electrical goods, textile and fertiliser among others.

Despite the growing demand for cheap Chinese goods, a survey conducted last year by pollster Ipsos-Synovate established that consumers in Kenya remain dissatisfied with the quality of products.

China has over the years faced massive challenges over sub-standard goods, leaving consumers in target markets such as Kenya jittery about purchasing them.

Chinese products however remain popular among low-end consumers who prefer them on the grounds of affordability.

“We are not condemning products from China but attempting to curb illegal trade in general. Not all products from China are substandard as some consumers may claim,” Mrs Oduor said.

“We believe China best understands its own manufacturers and would be handy in terms of tracking what each of them does,” she said.

Loss of revenues

Recent projections by the Kenya Association of Manufactures (KAM) showed that counterfeiters pushed pens, batteries, cosmetics, and a range of other products including crucial live-saving drugs across Africa, with estimates of counterfeit penetration ranging up to 40 per cent for some items.

The entry of Chinese products into countries such as Kenya has been buoyed by a strategic move by the Asian economic giant to venture into frontier markets in search of raw material to support its industrial boom.

The on-going knock-down of administrative barriers along the national borders of East African Community (EAC) member states has also been blamed for a fresh increase in the volume of trade in illegal goods that is costing manufacturers billions of shillings in market share and heavy revenue losses to governments.

Traders both in Kenya and the wider EAC region have recently claimed that unscrupulous entrepreneurs, both foreign and local, are exploiting the relaxed trade regime to illegally replicate well known brand names and designs on their packaging and labels, flooding the regional market with cheaper, substandard versions of locally available products.

EAC member countries are currently at an advanced stage in the preparation of common laws to manage the standards and quality of goods and products entering the common market.