Dangerous subs

Due to the low value of the rupee, people are shunning imported products in favour of local ones. This change produces opportunities for both honest businesses and crooks. People who were priced out of the high-end markets see a glimmer of hope with the advent of cheaper products. Sensible businesses would innovate and introduce cheaper items, clearly sensing an excited and viable market. Their hopes of gaining market share may reach fruition and increasing sales would buffer up their bottom lines.

Crooks are not standing by either. They want to deceive and fool people into buying products that are shoddy, unreliable, fabrications of the originals and of dubious quality. Imitations of genuine products are flooding the market including perfumes, apparel, hand bags and cosmetics. The losers in this scenario are consumers who want to pay less, but find that the degradation is far larger than they thought they were getting. The solution to this problem lies in the formation of a consumer privacy and protection agency, which would try to oversee any dangerous trends and take questionable products off the market as soon as possible.

Yasser Shah

Lahore