- The Saudi Consumer Protection Association (CPA) would like to inform you that they have joined Consumer International (CI), a global federation of consumer groups. The head of CPA said this membership will help them do a better job. I would really like to believe it, but this sounds to me more like a PR puff than anything else. CPA has almost nothing for local consumers in the past. I know they don’t care about a tiny consumer like myself, but here is my little piece of advice to Dr. Mohammed Al-Hamad and his agency: stop talking to the press and do some real work. Kthxbai.
- Saudiwoman: “I am currently on a family vacation in Italy but I had to post what the Ministry of Foreign Affairs sent my husband. Apparently they have a new service where they send the male guardian a text every time a “dependent” leaves the country. They don’t state which country the dependent left for but simply state that they did leave.”
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Saudi Jeans 
I find it interesting that in the news article, the only CPA initiative mentioned is their campaign against “counterfeit” car parts. My guess is that once the consumers have accepted the notion that “counterfeit” equals “risky”, they won’t object when customs authorities seizes a shipment of counterfeit jeans due to the very same piece of trademark legislation.
So if the car is built from 100 percent “authentic” parts, it will never break or hurt anyone?
In Italy and France, it’s even illegal to buy counterfeit goods, at the insistence of the original trademark owners. Product safety is not even an issue. A Norwegian boy visiting Italy with his school class bought a cheap watch from a street vendor. He didn’t care about the brand, but the police caught him, confiscated the watch, followed him to his hotel room to search his luggage, and also searched the luggage of his class mates travelling with the same bus. Oh, and he had to pay heavy fines as well.
Consumer protection? More like protecting the producers from non-loyal consumers…