From left, Omer Thomas and Doreen Frankson
Garwin Davis, Assistant News Editor
LOCAL MANUFACTURERS ave accused the Jamaica Bureau of Standards of not properly ensuring that goods coming into the island conform to the same standard required of locally-made products.
Members of the Jamaica Manufacturers' Association (JMA) who attended a Gleaner Editors' Forum last week, said the Bureau was not being sufficiently vigilant, adding that the country was now being inundated with cheaper, sub-standard foreign goods.
"Unfair competition is a major challenge for us and I am afraid the Bureau of Standards has not been doing much to assist local manufacturers," said Doreen Frankson, president of the JMA. "There is a tremendous amount of dumping that is taking place a lot of bad quality products that are coming in. The Bureau of Standards keeps the locally manufactured products at a very high standard but does not apply the same formula for the imported goods."
She cited particular concern about imported paint, agricultural produce and furniture. "It is amazing how bad the quality is for some of these foreign products coming in. There was a time when the Bureau was manufacturer-oriented and more focused. I don't know what it is now. It is not as effective as we would like it to be and maybe it is time we start to look at its composition to get a better sense as to what is its purpose."
Ms. Frankson added that there was also a health risk for consumers who are buying dumped nutritional products.
Ian Forbes, managing director of Sherwin Williams, agreed. He said many consumers found that the cheaper, imported paint starts stripping as soon as it rains.
The Bureau of Standards, while agreeing that it was not vigilant enough in its approach to ensuring proper standards, said global treaties such as the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) and the World Trade Organisation (WTO), make it difficult to prevent or curtail the heavy inflow of goods coming into Jamaica.
The agency's executive director, Dr. Omer Thomas, said "The Bureau needed to be more vigilant in ensuring that all products, whether local or imported, conform to Jamaican standards. However, there are instances where we enforce standards based on conformity to health and safety regulations so there are instances where low quality products such as processed foods have slipped by.
"Whereas, in the past the Bureau developed and implemented standards for the manufacturing industry, that is no longer the case. We now encourage the industry to develop its own standards with technical assistance from the Bureau to ensure locally made products are competitive in the global marketplace and that consumers' health and safety are protected. For example, we provide testing facilities for manufacturers."
Local manufacturers and producers have long complained that dumping has been taking a toll on their businesses and that they were unable to compete with cheap imports from places like China. The Government has offered some level of protection by hiking the tax on imported goods, particularly agricultural produce.
"There is a myth about buying quality goods from overseas," Ms. Frankson added. "In China, they have three levels of quality and we tend to buy the lowest of the three. And don't for a minute believe this has not affected us as a country. We have dropped from 120,000 jobs in the productive sector to 82,000. Jamaica, the Land of Wood and Water is now importing water. We produce high quality water in this country, yet there is the need to import."
Businessman and CEO of Sun Island Limited, Raymond Miles, agreed. "This whole concept of buying Jamaican is very important," he said. "When a tourist comes to Jamaica, he is not interested in items from China or from anywhere in the Far East. He wants good quality Jamaican products which we have here."
Trade consultant Peter King, a JMA member, said it was very important that the Government leads by example, noting that it was the biggest purchaser of foreign goods and services.
