Product protection vital

FINANCE and Rural Development Minister Rainbo Paita says the Government is just as concerned as the private sector to protect genuine products in the PNG market.
Paita said counterfeit products could influence the amount of confidence genuine investors had in emerging markets like PNG.
“From the Government’s point of view, we are improving on our systems and processes in terms of controlling and monitoring surveillance on products that have been sold not just in the beverage space but any other products for that matter,” Paita said following the launch of a ‘sales academy’ by Coca Cola Amatil (CCA) PNG on Friday in Port Moresby.
“We value genuine investors such as CCA who have spent substantial amount of money investing.
“I was told in the last three years they have invested around 200-300million in PNG and in a couple of years they will continue to invest.
“As a responsible Government in the last five months, we have instituted systems to improve, monitoring and surveillance so that those issues like fake products being circulated in the market can be dealt with.
“That’s from the Government level, so we give comfort to our partners like Coca Cola Amatil that the Government is doing its best.
“The Government is taking very harsh steps to deal with concerned parties appropriately because that disrupts the amount of confidence that companies continue to put into emerging markets such as Papua New Guinea,” Paita said.
Meanwhile, Kadir Gunduz, regional managing director of Coca Cola Amatil Indonesia and CCAPNG, said the company was optimistic about PNG’s economy.
“We are really confident, we are very optimistic about the future of PNG and our business in PNG. That is why we never slow down making investments in infrastructure,” Gunduz said.