Consumers buy fakes due to peer pressure, love for luxury & more: CRISIL

• Common items, from cumin seeds to cooking oil and from baby care items to medicines, are increasingly being reported as counterfeit, said a report by ASPA and CRISIL.
  
  
• Nearly 27% of the consumers were unaware that the product was counterfeit at the time of purchase, according to the ‘State of Counterfeiting in India 2022’ report.
  
  
• Illicit goods trade stood at ₹2.6 lakh crore in FY 2019-20 in India and affected almost all sectors, said the president of ASPA.
  

A majority of Indians believe that 25-30% of all the products in the market are fake or counterfeit, says an industry survey. So much so, 89% of them acknowledged the presence of fakes in a report by rating agency CRISIL and Authentication Solution Providers’ Association (ASPA).

“They (consumers) are often compelled to buy counterfeits for reasons such as sensitivity to price, demand-supply gap, desire to buy luxury brands, peer pressure, and social motivations,” the report named ‘State of Counterfeiting in India 2022’ said.

However, nearly 27% of the consumers were unaware that the product was counterfeit at the time of purchase. “Counterfeiting is not limited to high-end luxury items. Even common items, from cumin seeds to cooking oil and from baby care items to medicines, are increasingly reported as counterfeit. An important finding of the survey was that consumer perception pegged the extent of counterfeiting at 25-30% of the market, higher than the general industry expectation,” said Suresh Krishnamurthy, Senior Director, CRISIL Market Intelligence and Analytics.

The survey says that the top segment where consumers come across the most is apparel at 31%. Next comes FMCG at 28%, and automotives at 25%. This is followed by pharmaceuticals (20%), consumer durables (17%), and agrochemicals (16%). The report says that even after discovering that the product is fake, consumers take close to negligible action about reporting.

“Illicit goods trade stood at ₹2.6 lakh crore in FY 2019-20 in India and affected almost all sectors. It is on the rise and heavily bleeding the country, industry, and consumers by large. An aware consumer holds the power to fight this menace; however, we must enhance consumer awareness about this issue,” said Nakul Pasricha, president of ASPA.

The report is based on an independent survey conducted with consumers and retailers covering twelve cities, namely – Delhi, Agra, Jalandhar, Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Jaipur, Indore, Kolkata, Patna, Chennai, Bangalore, and Hyderabad, to gauge their perception of counterfeiting in several key sectors.

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