Why is China a significant producer of Counterfeit Products? (2024)

Of all the counterfeit products sold worldwide, China has the highest proportion and production market of counterfeits. It is because Chinese markets have access to all the resources required to produce counterfeits due to their high production rate, low-cost labour, and adaptive technologies setup by significant brands since the reform of China’s economy in 1978.

Over the years, Chinese markets flourished with utmost production of nearly every product globally, leading to improved living standards. However, this new industrial power and later the demand for cheap products led them to imitate and produce counterfeits — which turned out to be beneficial for much greater living standards.

By the mid-1990s, other factories specialising in footwear began producing fake sneakers of world-renowned brands like Nike, Adidas, Reebok, and more. Soon it brought in the opportunity for counterfeiters to illegally chuck out originals or even blueprints of upcoming products by bribing the employees at the genuine factories.

There are widely three reasons why China can produce and account for 63.2% of the counterfeit seizures worldwide. Below, we have tried to throw some light on ‘How China does it?’ below.

1. The workers are skilled enough to produce lofty imitations in less than a month because these are usually not made under one roof but many. For example, any recently launched sneaker is fetched from the original store, brought inside these factories, and then examined, dissecting the product's dynamics to send it to the workers. The counterfeit sneakers produced by different factories are picked up by couriers, packed, and shipped to the intersections through stealthy routes and back alleys. Thereafter, at any given time, these are shipped to their destinations as per the regional demand of the product.
2. Another significant reason Why the People’s Republic of China is one of the world's greatest producers of counterfeits is the partial implementation of enforcement and laws inside the mainland. Though willing to take action, the governments and authorities often fail against the sneaky production centres and less stringent mechanisms. One example of such a case is – In the city of fakes “Putian”, the police officials and the potential lawyers only raids and compelled to shut down the counterfeit sneakers factories in the morning hours, allowing them to do the business as soon as the sun sets. It depicts that the production of counterfeits in eastern countries is considered a viable option for earning, as far as the demand permits.
3. In addition to that, the public of China is entirely aware of the abundant supply of counterfeits available just about everywhere. Even though people tend to buy genuine products from official stores and supermarkets — they are accessible to the infringing versions of the same products being sold at nearby closed or open-air wholesale markets, small retail stores, side street kiosks, and by unlicensed street vendors and hawkers. This open accessibility allows consumers or buyers to make bulk purchases of any infringed product and transport them through less stringent networks of transit points.

Therefore, the streamlined process, availability of resources, and the subsequent network makes China the largest producer and exporter of counterfeits worldwide.