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SON restates commitment to safeguarding local industries

By Femi Adekoya
30 November 2016   |   2:55 am
The Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON) has restated its commitment to the mandate to safeguard local industrial firms in the country from unfair competition ...
DG of SON, Osita Anthony Aboloma

DG of SON, Osita Anthony Aboloma

Destroys substandard goods worth over N500m
The Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON) has restated its commitment to the mandate to safeguard local industrial firms in the country from unfair competition arising from the influx of substandard goods into the country. Besides, the agency has destroyed sub-standard goods valued at N500 million having failed standards/quality tests conducted on them.

The Director General, SON, Dr. Osita Aboloma, explained that this move was to ensure that local production is given the necessary support and encouragement to compete favourably with only goods that meet the minimum requirement of the Nigeria Industrial Standards (NIS) while also earning the much needed foreign exchange for the country.

Aboloma ‎added that for local industries to grow there is a need to protect the industry from unfair competition, maintaining that Nigeria’s economic growth is hinged on industrial development.

The Director-General‎said: “Our fight against these goods is to help government to achieve its effort to diversify the economy by supporting our local industries. For our industries to grow, we need to protect them from unfair competition from these fake products.‎”

He added that some of these substandard goods imported from unknown destinations were carrying the made-in-Nigeria logos to deceive unsuspecting Nigerian consumers.

“This is part of our duty to checking the menace in Nigeria, we have apprehended various substandard products that was imported by fraudulent Nigerians. These goods such as cables, baby’s diapers, energy saving bulbs and many more are going to be destroyed, we are not only going to stop at destroying them, but will also go after the unscrupulous people who brought this in and prosecute them in accordance with the SON act 2015,” he said.

According to him, this would send a strong message to other importers of fake products that Nigeria is not a country where they can do business as usual anymore.

“These products failed the quality parameters test, but still found their way into our market. We intercepted these goods on the way and they are hazardous to health and drain our economy.

“This is an economic sabotage and it is criminal. We should all come together and combat this menace. It is not only the duty of SON. We will keep apprehending and destroying them because our new mandate is to safeguard the growing industries and economy. This is a collective duty by all Nigerians in the fight against substandard products. We want to help our industries to grow so that we can foreign exchange from exporting our goods.

“We are not going to stop apprehending these goods. We have intercepted about 10 trailers of substandard goods worth over N500 million. We will keep going after them, we need to protect our people and the economy, we are begging every Nigerian to work with SON to make sure that we reduce the preponderance of substandard goods in the country to the barest minimum,” Osita said.

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