A senior official said at a news conference in Beijing yesterday
that counterfeit goods worth 100 million yuan (US$12 million) have
so far been taken off shelves nationwide in a year-long campaign
launched by authorities last November.
"The crackdown, initiated by the Ministry of Public Security
last November, is targeted at slashing the number of fake
products," said Xiang Xin, secretary-general of the Office of the
National Working Group for Intellectual Property Rights Protection,
and products seized include sporting goods, pharmaceuticals and
auto parts.
She said 419 suspects involved have been arrested.
In the biggest case, a gang in east China's Zhejiang
Province was caught with 650,000 boxes of fake Gillette
products valued at 30 million yuan (US$3.5 million).
Last June, the Taizhou Industrial and Commercial Administration
grew suspicious of a man, You Fushun, and had reason to believe he
was involved with counterfeiting so reported him to local
police.
The subsequent investigation found that You and several
colleagues regularly made trips to Ningbo, a port city in Zhejiang,
to transport fake razors to Yiwu, a commodity centre in the
province.
By October 27, the bureau had raided a company which made fake
razors in Ningbo, and searched a number of other places known to be
frequented by You and his partners.
Police seized 50 boxes of the razors in Yiwu and caught You and
another six suspects red-handed.
Following the case, the Ministry of Public Security launched a
massive investigation throughout Zhejiang.
Other counterfeit products seized over the past five months
include auto parts bearing Toyota, Nissan, Mitsubishi and Mazda
brand names, fake Viagra, shoes with Adidas and Nike labels, and
the famous Chinese liquor Wuliangye.
"We found that one of the factors contributing to the serious
counterfeit drug problem is that bulk chemicals are freely
available from unauthorized pharmaceutical manufactures," said Wang
Xunbiao, Pfizer China's PR manager.
"These substances can easily be acquired by drug counterfeiters
and used as active ingredients in phony drugs," Wang said.
At the same news conference, Zhao Gang, from the State
Administration for Industry and Commerce, said industry and
commerce management departments at all levels reported 51,851 cases
involving trademark infringements last year, up 27 percent on
2003.
They included 40,171 trademark counterfeits, up 51.6 percent
year-on-year, 5,401 of which involved foreign trademarks, up 158
percent. A total of 82 suspects involved in 96 cases were sent to
judicial departments.
The administration said that it will continue the campaign to
protect trademarks across the country.
Thirteen government departments, including the National Office
of Rectification and Standardization of Market Economic Order, the
Publicity Department of the Communist Party of China and the
Ministry of Information Industry, plan to jointly launch a campaign
on intellectual property rights protection from April 20 to 26, in
an effort to increase public awareness of intellectual property and
stifle counterfeiting.
(China Daily, Xinhua News Agency April 8, 2005)