Countering Counterfeit Trade Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2750 words

Countering Counterfeit Trade - Assignment Example Counterfeiting is a big business in the world today. It is so big that the total volume of counterfeit (and pirated) goods in the world exceeds the GDP of certain countries. The International Anti-counterfeiting Coalition (IACC) estimates this figure at around 600billion dollars per year. The sad fact is that the menace is growing and many countries and organizations negatively affected by it are quite helpless to find a solution to the menace. The IACC says that the growth of counterfeiting over the last twenty years has been about ten thousand percent. Astonishingly, one of the reasons behind this growth is the consumer demand for counterfeit goods. This paper is an assessment of the counterfeit auto parts industry in the United Arab Emirates in particular and the other countries in the GCC in general. In the process, the nature of the industry, costs to consumers and affected organizations, the reason why people buy counterfeit products (auto parts), some statistics, anti-counterf eiting groups, etc will also be reviewed. This will be followed by some recommendations on how this can be brought down (if not eliminated altogether) and a conclusion summing up the paper. It should be noted that most of what has been written here has been sourced from articles that appeared in the Gulf News and Khaleej Times. There are three types of auto parts available in the UAE namely original equipment, legitimate parts, and counterfeit parts. Original equipment is those made by auto manufactures or by approved original equipment suppliers. Legitimate equipment is those made by other companies sold in their own brand names and will usually be of good quality. They are not intended to cheat the customer. Counterfeit products are usually meant to cheat the customer into thinking that they are genuine.