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LCQ19: Combating the sale of counterfeit goods
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    Following is a question by the Hon Lau Kong-wah and a written reply by the Secretary for Financial Services and the Treasury, Mr Frederick Ma (in the absence of the Secretary for Commerce, Industry and Technology), in the Legislative Council today (May 2):

Question:

     On combating the sale of counterfeit goods, will the Government inform this Council of the following in the past two years:

(a) the number of enforcement actions taken by the Administration to combat or clamp down on shops selling counterfeit goods, and whether such enforcement actions were mainly conducted in the form of "undercover" operations; and

(b) the number of complaints received by the Administration relating to the sale of counterfeit goods, broken down by nature of business, as well as the quantity and value of counterfeit goods seized, broken down by the categories of the goods?

Reply:

Madam President,
   
(a) The statistics relating to the enforcement actions taken by the Customs and Excise Department (C&ED) against shops and stalls selling counterfeit goods are given in Annex 1.

     C&ED combats various counterfeiting activities through in-depth investigations based on intelligence and stern raiding actions. Under special circumstances, C&ED conducts "controlled buying" operations (by "undercover" staff) to help collecting evidence.

(b) The number of complaints relating to sale of counterfeit goods received by C&ED in the past two years is set out at Annex 2.

     The number of complaints received far exceeds the number of cases acted on. This is because: some complaints are repetitive (i.e. more than one complaint received for the same case); some involve goods which are found not to be counterfeit; some do not have accurate or sufficient details for further follow-up; some involve unregistered trade marks; and some are cases where no trained personnel is available in Hong Kong to give authoritative advice on the counterfeit nature of the goods involved.

     The quantity and value of goods seized in the past two years are set out at Annex 3.

Ends/Wednesday, May 2, 2007
Issued at HKT 12:20

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