India main source of detained medicine shipments in EU

More than €1.1 billion-worth of goods suspected of contravening intellectual property rights (IPR) were detained by customs at EU borders last year, including around €27 million-worth of medical products.

There were 1,800 detentions involving medicines and related healthcare products such as condoms, according to a just-published report by the European Commission. Almost all (93 per cent) of seizures were deemed to have originated from India, with China accounting for a further 4.7 per cent and Hong Kong another 0.9 per cent.

Proportionally, medicine seizures were well down on the prior year, at just 2 per cent of total cases versus 10 per cent in 2009, although the total number of detentions across all product categories rose dramatically, from 43,000 in 2009 to 80,000.

In absolute terms the number of seized medical articles fell, from 11.5 million in 2009 to a little over 3.2 million articles (see also Medicine seizures by EU customs rise again in 2009). One of the major trends in 2010 was the growing number of detentions of postal packages and,  interestingly, nearly 69 per cent of small consignments detained in postal traffic were medicines.

Algirdas Semeta, Commissioner for Taxation, Customs, Anti-fraud and Audit said: "We have experienced a spectacular increase of detentions in the postal traffic since last year: the number of cases tripled from 15,000 to over 48,000 and many of the seized goods included medicines and body care products."

The upward trend reflects a growing number of online purchases, he added.

For all product categories, there was a slight reduction in the number of articles seized, down to 103m from 118m. The top categories of articles stopped by customs were cigarettes (34 per cent), office supplies (9 per cent) other tobacco products (8 per cent), labels, tags and emblems (8 per cent), clothing (7 per cent) and toys (7 per cent).

In May, the EC published a 'blueprint' document setting out a strategy to revamp the legal framework in which IPR operate within Europe. The new strategy includes elements such as greater cooperation between member states on patents, more streamlined trademark registrations and a new customs regulation which seeks to expand the range of IPR violations covered and boost powers to tackle small-consignment trade in infringing goods.