Though a global phenomenon, Nigeria’s share of the boom in the importation, manufacturing, distribution, and consumption of substandard products has assumed endemic and life-threatening proportion. The problem, which has left sour taste in the mouth of consumers and operators in all sectors, continues to defy measures put in place by the authorities to contain it, reports Assist. Editor Chikodi Okereocha
It Is extremely difficult these days to extract a smile from the Chairman of DN Meyer Plc, Sir Remi Omotoso, particularly when the state of Nigeria’s manufacturing sector is the focus of discussion. The 69-year old industrialist wears a long face every time he remembers the heavy toll the unbridled importation, production, distribution and consumption of fake and substandard products is taking on manufacturers and, by implication, the economy.
“If you look at how manufacturers are affected by products faking and importation of substandard materials you shudder. Many of them are suffering a lot,” he pointed out, in an interview with The Nation.
Giving more insight into how the booming trade in substandard products is taking the shine off manufacturers, Omotoso, a former Director General of Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI), said: “You can’t export freely because our products will not be able to pass international standards test. Not the ones we produce, but the ones that are faked affect the ones that are genuine. They go and put the label of a good product on a bad product and once they get out of the shores of the country nobody knows which one that was genuinely produced and the one that was faked. Its a major threat to our economy.”
Lagos lawyer and public affairs analyst Obiora Akabogu agrees with him. “The free reign of importers of substandard products is killing the home industry, and it’s a threat to the economy,” Akabogu said, accusing the regulatory agencies of being incompetent.
According to him, the agencies charged with regulating standards and protecting the interest of consumers have performed below average. The fight against substandard products, he observed, has been “one step forward, two steps backward”.
He observed that in the case of Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON), for instance, it was at the zenith of the sterling performance of National Agency for Food, Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) under the late Prof. Dora Akunyili that the leadership of SON decided to make its voice heard and its impact felt. He said shortly after Mrs Akunyili’s exit from the agency, SON, which got its stimulus for performance from NAFDAC, lost steam. Same for NAFDAC, which he said has retrogressed following the exit of the late Akunyili.
Akabogu recalled, for instance, that during the late Mrs Akunyili’s era, there were cases where full containers of essential drugs were imported into the country and when their efficacy and potency were tested, it was found out that they were reduced by about 60 per cent. Subsequently the drugs were duly seized and set on fire and the perpetrators prosecuted while their offices were sealed. He regretted that such scenario, which used to be a daily occurrence in places like Aba, Onitsha, Ibadan, Kano, and Lagos, but were contained by NAFDAC, is gradually coming back.
“The bad guys (importers of fake and substandard products) are back. It is business-as-usual. The fight against fake drugs died with Akunyili, leaving the average Nigerians exposed daily to inconsumable and substandard products,” Akabogu said, noting that the menace of substandard products has become endemic and life-threatening, posing health risk to consumers and putting tremendous pressure on the local economy. He said the situation was regrettable, considering the billions of naira voted to the agencies annually, including the billions of naira received from donor agencies and development partners.
There has been growing concern over the preponderance of adulterated or substandard products in the country. Many consumers who purchase products like foods, beverages, pharmaceutical drugs, batteries, tyres, paint, electrical cables, bulbs and mobile phones have been raising issues over the quality and standard of products in markets. For instance, within the first year of its existence, the Lagos Office of ConsumerProtection Council (CPC) was inundated with between 20-30 of such consumer complaints every month. About three years later, the number of complaints rose to between 500-800 every month, according to Tam Tamunokonbia, Head, Lagos Office of CPC.
Tamunokonbia told The Nation that the increased number of consumer complaints is an indication of increased awareness following the adoption of the use of social media so that consumers could reach the CPC on e-mail, twitter and Facebook, adding that the prevalence rate of substandard products is higher in the Southeast, particularly in places such as Cemetery Market in Aba, Abia State, Ogbaru Market in Onitsha, Anambra State, as well as the Enugu market.
“The people manufacturing substandard products are more in certain markets in Aba and Onitsha. In Lagos you see pockets of such people. Lagos being what it is, you still have some hide-outs where those things still happen. But if you put the whole of Nigeria in perspective, then the prevalent rate should be about 40 per cent because you could have some in Kano, some in the north, some in the South-south. But in terms of percentage I would give 40 per cent to the South east and probably 10 per cent here and there,” he explained.
Throwing more light on how the counterfeiting is done, he said after the production of the substandard products, they are transported out of the South east to various markets in the Southsouth such as Port-Harcourt and Calabar, including Lagos in the Southwest, depending on the manufacturer’s calculation of profit margin. He noted that there is a degree of production of substandard products in the country, and that the unscrupulous producers usually make arrangements for the labeling outside Nigeria, in China, for instance.
He said: “When we carried out a raid recently in Cemetery Market in Aba, we discovered peak milk was being produced. To our surprise they had already imported the label of the sachet powdered peak milk from China. The label was just the same, exactly the same powdered peak milk label.”
That was not the only shocker. Tamunokonbia said for the tin milk, his men discovered that the producers picked the tin from scavengers or from dustbin, washed them and cleaned them up. “So the label is still the same; everything is the same so consumers would not be able to know the difference,” he said, adding that there are some products as well that are produced outside the country in which case the Council is working in collaboration with other relevant agencies to halt the illicit trade.
For those who produce substandard products locally, their usual excuse is that the nation’s huge infrastructure gap, particularly power, puts tremendous pressure on their operations. Some of them argue that rising cost of raw materials and provision of power eats into their profit margin, forcing them to thinker with the quality of their products to remain in business. What this means is that if the operating environment were to be more friendly, they would have been producing quality products. But Akabogu describes this position as false. According to him, Nigeria is an import-dependent economy, with Nigerians as mere importers, wholesalers, and retailers. He said most of the substandard products are manufactured in Asia and imported into Nigeria, exposing consumers to all manner of health risk.
Tamunokonbia said the CPC is living up to its mandate to protect consumers. Established by Act No. 66 of 1992, the CPC, a parastatal supervised by the Federal Ministry of Trade and Investment, commenced operations in 1999, when its institutional framework was put in place. The Council has the mandate to, among others, eliminate hazardous products from the market, provide speedy redress to consumers’ complaints, and undertake campaigns as will lead to increased consumer awareness.
It was in the course of carrying out its mandate that the CPC recently uncovered the sale of a brand of cigarette, ESSE EDGE, in the Nigerian markets with a post-dated production date of September, 2014. The product is said to be distributed in Nigeria by Black Horse Tobacco Company, but made in Korea by Korea Tobacco and Ginseng Corporation (KT&G). CPC stated that falsifying the production date of the ESSE EDGE cigarette was a calculated attempt to manipulate the cigarette’s shelf life and keep it in the market longer than required, thereby constituting grave health hazards to consumers.
The agency said in view of its resolve to raise awareness on the value of checking the BB (Best Before) date of products, it has commenced the removal of the defective ESSE EDGE cigarette from the market. It, however, cautioned the public, including wholesalers, retailers and consumers to beware of the defective cigarette, whose actual date of manufacture is unknown, and to report any manipulation to it. The Council also advised wholesalers, retailers and consumers to always check the date of manufacture on their pack of cigarettes and all other products before they purchase.
Tamunokonbia said since the launch of the ‘Check the BB Date Campaign’ by the Minister of Industry, Trade and investment, Dr. Olusegun Aganga, the Lagos Office has taken the campaign a notch higher by conducting a road show that went through most of the supermarkets in Lagos. “We have given a warning that sellers who do not comply with this campaign after six months will be arrested and persecuted,” he said, adding that the six-months notice started July 1, 2014 at the end of which the Council will do a sustained surveillance whereby its enforcement officers will be visiting shops, supermarkets and market places to do seizures and to also arrest.
CPC also handed down an ultimatum to product dealers to stop indiscriminate storing, which could undermine the quality of products. At the launch of the campaign in Abuja, CPC Director General, Mrs. Dupe Atoki, frowned at the storing of some products in the Nigerian market-place, claiming that it has been undermining the quality of the products. “It is also common knowledge that even when not expired, the quality of most products gets compromised when stored under harsh weather conditions”, she noted.
Mrs. Atoki also said it is worrisome that most super stores across the country stock their bottled water and beverages under direct sunlight in front of their shops for weeks on end. The practice of storing such items under the sun, she said, is unacceptable as it negates the storage conditions stipulated for them by the manufacturers, thereby exposing consumers to injury. She gave dealers six months with effect from July 1 to find alternative ways of storing such products or have them withdrawn from the market. She charged manufacturers to use the six-month period of moratorium to train all those in their distribution chain on how best to store their products, and to stock only products that they can store properly.
SON intensifies campaign
A survey by SON puts the prevalence rate of substandard products in the country at between 80 and 85 per cent. The survey was done about three years ago when its current Director General (DG), Dr. Joseph Odumodu assumed office. The result of the survey wasscary and unacceptable considering the fact that in Egypt and Kenya, for instance, only 40 per cent of products are said to be substandard. South Africa’s was less than 30 per cent.
The agency, however, said the level of substandard products in Nigeria has dropped from 85 per cent to 50 per cent in the last two years following the intensification of its ‘Zero Tolerance’ campaign. It added that it is determined to further reduce the prevalence of substandard goods to 30 per cent. The Public Relations Officer (PRO) of SON, Mr. Mathias Bassey. told The Nation that Nigerians are already imbibing the culture of zero tolerance for substandard products. He said the increasing awareness of Nigerians is on the strength of various initiatives, programmes and sensitisation efforts of the agency. Apart from SON’s ‘Zero Tolerance’ campaign, the agency, he said, had put in place the SON Off Shore Conformity Assessment Programme (SONCAP), Manufacturers Association of Nigeria Conformity Assessment Programme (MANCAP), as well as embarked on several market surveys and enforcement exercises.
While SONCAP aimed at ensuring that products are easily identifiable by providing that before a trader orders goods, the importer must get a certificate for all regulated products before shipment into Nigeria, MANCAP ensures that any product made in Nigeria carry the MANCAP certificate as well as the Nigeria Industrial Standards (NIS) certificate.
In insisting on MANCAP, the agency said it found out that people were bringing in goods from all kinds of places and avoiding the ports.
The agency claims that the programmes are paying off. For instance, Odumodu disclosed recently that the level of certified domestic products improved to 13 per cent from the less than 10 per cent obtained in 2011. He put the number of MANCAP-Certified companies in 2013 at 546, while certified products in 2013 were 821. He said many consumer products are now registered and captured on the SON website with 6, 899 registered products and 927 registered companies so far.
On the other hand, the re-engineered SONCAP regime, Odumodu said, has significantly improved compliance with extant import conformity regulations. He added that sensitisation campaigns and engagement were held across the six geo-political zones of the country, and that survey confirmed 65 per cent level of consumer awareness on substandard products. Importers at the Alaba International market and traders in the Computer village, both in Lagos, as well as others in other popular markets across the country are said to have benefited from the sensitisation programme of SON aimed at stamping out substandard products.
Also, the agency has engaged in capacity building consumer engagement (market desks, road shows, advertising, and enlightenment campaign to educate the masses. The compliance monitoring efforts of SON are also said to have yielded fruit. For instance, SON has reviewed and enforced standards in the roofing sheet sub sector of the nation’s building construction industry. Conformity to standards in steel development is also said to have led to quality improvement, resulting in a glut of quality steel bars in the country, just as the agency has addressed local capacity and quality in the cement sub sector.
Bassey added that SON’s collaborative effort with relevant stakeholders and industry associations particularly block moulders is also yielding good results. He was however, quick to point out that “spreading the culture of zero tolerance to substandard products is neither a one-day affair nor a one man’s job; it requires the effort of all, and it will take time.”
He disclosed that the National Quality Policy (NQP), which seeks to produce a broad-based system that would provide quality specifications for all manufactured products in the country, is still before the National Assembly for approval.
A war, its many challenges
Despite the sustained campaign by the standard/enforcement agencies to contain the reign of substandard products, the problem persists. This, Kola Oladipo, former Chairman, Export Group of MAN, attributes to poor funding, inadequate staffing of the agencies, and corruption at the ports. Oladipo is right. For instance, while the Lagos Office of CPC is looking forward to an increase in the number of consumer complaints from about 500 to 1, 000 a month, given the large population of the commercial city of Lagos, Tamunokonbia said he has his fears.
“My greatest fear is that when this complaint increases to a thousand mark plus, can we cope? Because as it is, my members of staff are over-stretched. We are supposed to have a department for surveillance and enforcement, which is the department that handles complaints. Because we don’t have such department, what that has done is to stretch everybody,” he said.
Apart from the challenge of inadequate staffing, The Nation learnt that the few staff on the payroll of the agencies are poorly motivated. Akabogu said that this is why some members of staff of the agencies allegedly compromise.
“They (agency staff) compromise because of fear of the unknown; many of them are wary of what will happen to them after retirement. So, some of them want to get anything they can from the system before they retire,” he said.
The public affairs analyst also identified lack of conviction by the judiciary as another factor. According to him, in China, offences relating to dealing in substandard products carry life sentences or even death penalty. “Ask any of the agencies to give you statistics or data on conviction of offenders, you will be disappointed they don’t have any,” he said.
For Omotoso, SON appears to be overwhelmed.
“Maybe because the scope SON is covering is so wide, from table, pin, electrical cables, bulbs, all sort of things; the scope they have to police is so wide, maybe that’s part of the problem of their inability to do all that they need to do,” he said, noting that this perhaps explains why the war against substandard products is not being won, and is not limited to paint manufacturing alone.
“Put your mind to tyres. Till date, I don’t think we have fought the battle of preventing fake tyres from coming into this country. Fake tyres are as dangerous and life threatening as fake malaria products,” he said.
In fairness to SON, however, the nation’s porous borders through which most of the suspected substandard products find their way into the country, are not helping the fight.
The Comptroller General of the Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS), David Parradang, recently revealed that there are over 1, 400 illegal routes into Nigeria – 1,316 more than the approved number of border control posts. He said the 84 approved border controls cover 4, 047 kilometres, the total length of Nigeria’s land border. Ogun and Adamawa states, for example, have 83 and 80 illegal posts. To make matters worse, those entrusted with the task of securing the borders are ill-equipped to effectively monitor the 84 regular routes let alone the 1,400 illegal ones.
The threat posed by illegal borders to the fight against substandard products is not lost on the agencies.
“We are not at the borders; the CPC is not allowed to be at the borders, and there are substandard products that come in from the borders, its difficult for us to know,” Tamunokonbia said.
He explained that once the substandard products are in the country, they are taken to warehouses from where they are moved into the various markets and unless the agency knows, they cannot arrest the perpetrators.
“We think that if we arrest them from the border, it will make more sense. In fact, what you will be doing is that you will have a large cache of those products because they will come in their trailers. But in the market place, we are only seizing drops of the products,” he stated, adding however, that he recently paid a courtesy call on the Lagos Zonal Comptroller of Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) to solicit his assistance since CPC is not at the borders.
Tamunokonbia expressed optimism that his approach will work, as the Zonal Comptroller admitted that the Customs too also needs information “because as customs they do not necessarily know which product is fake and substandard. Their duty is just to collect tax. Their training does not allow them to know which one is fake and which is not, but if NAFDAC is there and it is a product of food and drugs they should be able to know. Also, if SON is there they will also know, same CPC. So, we want to partner with them, we want to work with them.”
The need to work with relevant agencies is underscored by the perceived lack of coordination and sometimes, overlap of interests and activities, which sometimes result to disagreements amongst the agencies. Dr. Odumodu admits that Nigeria’s standard operation was faced with many challenges arising partly from the lack of NQP to hold the system and make it functional and efficient enough to earn global confidence.
Indeed, over time, operations of government agencies set up to regulate and ensure good standards, such as SON, NAFDAC, Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), National Universities Commission (NUC), National Judicial Council (NJC), Police, and Public Service Commission, among others, have been uncoordinated because of the lack of a framework. Each of the agencies operates independently and, in some cases, on ad hoc basis, diminishing the fighting spirit of the agencies.
If the war must be won
To begin with, Akabogu suggests that the fight against substandard products must be inculcated into the national ideology and included in the school curricula from primary to university level. He said that way, enough awareness would be created. He also said the hands of the regulatory agencies, including SON, NAFDAC, CPC, and NCC, among others, must be immediately strengthened through adequate staffing and funding. He added that there is need to weed out bad elements within the agencies and allow only people willing to leave a legacy remain. Besides, laws against the business must be made punitive to serve as deterrent.
Omotoso could not agrees. He insisted that punitive measures should be enforced.
His words: “The laws are there, but somehow there is a lot of compromise. Who are those people that compromise? Those that are supposed to be enforcing the law. When they are taking to court, somehow the process is slow and those that are perpetrating this evils know that the courts won’t get round to them even before they pass on so, they just do the most havoc they could. I don’t want to say the courts are corrupt. No. But the process of justice is too slow to make the enforcement of the laws effective.”
The industrialist is not done. He said civil servants who are employees of SON should also be a little bit more aggressive in pursuing the culprits, while their facility for detection must be upped. He added that staff of the agencies should be encouraged by way of some forms of motivations for them to be able to do their job such that they will even want to say no to any offer of bribe from any of the perpetrators of the evil. “I am passionate about this because I know they do a lot of damage to the economy of this country, he concluded.
Oladipo aligns with Bassey who earlier noted that standards is not a one man job, so everybody must come on board. “SON cannot go it alone,” Oladipo told The Nation, arguing that since manufacturers are more spread “they should go all out to look for those who clone their products.” He admonished manufacturers to rise up to the fight.
For Champions of Development Nigeria (CDN), an integrated approach to quality management in Nigeria is required. The group’s President, Mr. Jonas Yomi, stated that the harmonisation of regulatory agencies and quality policies was overdue if Nigeria was determined to establish a national quality infrastructure, which is an important tool for implementing NQP. The group also lamented the non-existence or insignificant number of accredited laboratories in Nigeria, noting that accredited labs are the backbone of valid testing results without which products or services cannot be said to be certified or conforming to requirements. He added that there is need to reach out across the whole spectrum of stakeholders through road shows as well as sustained mass media campaign.
Sound and far-reaching recommendations, no doubt. But again their implementation, to a very large extent, depends on how far government musters the political will to prosecute the war, and of course, how far Nigerians and concerned stakeholders put their hand on deck to contain the upsurge. But until and unless this is done, unscrupulous businessmen importing substandard products will continue to smile to the bank while local manufacturers groan under the stiff competition from imports.
