Odienné, Sept 17, 2021 (AIP) – The representation of the Customs administration in Odienné proceeded, Friday September 17, 2021, to the destruction by fire of contraband products, with a total market value of 69,545,000 F CFA.
Specifically, 218 cartons of cigarettes valued at 65.4 million F and counterfeit medicines with an estimated value of 4,145,000 F were set in the fire, at the new municipal landfill, according to legal provisions, in particular in the presence of authorities. security officials and representatives of administration services related to the activity.
Head of the subdivision in charge of the fight against narcotics and drugs counterfeiting of the regional directorate of Man, Captain Anicet Bognon reiterated the commitment of the local administration to play its part in the best possible way in the mission of protecting the Ivorian economy, devolved to Customs services.
He called for the strengthening of customs / population cooperation to put an end to smuggling activities, with their devastating effects both on the national economy and on human health.
Local health officials have reiterated, on occasion, the exhortation to populations to divert street drugs.
The Odienné brigade, dismemberment of the subdivision responsible for the fight against the counterfeiting of narcotics and drugs of the regional customs directorate of Man, seized the goods incinerated today. The area of competence of the regional customs office in Man extends from the department of Issia to the far north-west, on the borders with Guinea and Mali. Two supply areas for smugglers.
According to the African Industrial Association (AIA), the Ivorian economy during the first decade of 2000 lost overall CFAF 780 billion due to smuggling of prohibited goods of all kinds.
The fake drugs specifically, sold in the streets, cause the legal pharmaceutical sector to lose each year “40 to 50 billion CFA francs (76 million euros) including more than 5 billion for the State”, according to Perfect Kouassi. , former president of the order of pharmacists of Côte d’Ivoire.
Medicines responsible for nearly 100,000 deaths per year in Africa according to the World Health Organization (WHO).
The rise in cigarette smuggling, for its part, generated a shortfall of nearly 108 billion F CFA on the revenues of West African States between 2013 and 2015. The tobacco industry of the sub-region, over the same period, estimated at nearly 11.3 billion the number of cigarettes sold in contraband, which is equivalent to 314 billion CFA francs.
Source: Agence Ivoirienne de Presse