00:00President of the Private Pharmacy Retail Business Association, Glenwyn Suchit, tells the Morning Edition,
00:07the existing Fair Trade Commission is falling short and is inadequate.
00:12He explains that the complaints process is outdated and slow, stymieing justice for affected businesses
00:19and leaving the sector vulnerable to unfair trade practices.
00:24These conglomerates that we are looking at, their pockets are very deep.
00:28And we are not prepared or even interested in wasting 10, 15 years to fight this down into 2030 or 2045.
00:36The answer to this solution is a change in legislation, updating the Fair Trade Commission to a standard,
00:43as Mr. Hussain always reminds me, we at Third World want to be First World, but we're really Fourth World.
00:50Suchit says, an unfair monopoly is taking hold in Trinidad and Tobago's pharmaceutical industry,
00:56noting that currently there is a company that owns manufacturing, distribution and retail, which should not be.
01:04He adds that the Fair Trade Commission must step up and do more to address the situation.
01:11We shouldn't have to go and make a complaint and provide a 15-page list of items that we are doing
01:19and do our survey and get information on the company.
01:23The Fair Trade Commission should have legislation to act on their own, have oversight,
01:29and initiate on their own action, assessment, investigation, and punitive measures to control growing things.
01:40Meanwhile, Wazir Hussain, former president of the Pharmacy Board and current executive
01:46at the Private Pharmacy Retail Business Association, is also sounding the alarm.
01:52He says, all they want is a level playing field.
01:55He warns that unfair practices in Trinidad and Tobago's pharmaceutical sector
02:01are holding back businesses and hurting consumers,
02:04and that urgent action from the Fair Trade Commission is long overdue.
02:09What we have seen in the last year, year and a half,
02:13prices, especially from this particular distributor,
02:16is going up almost every three months
02:18because we have no oversight.
02:22And the irony of that is we talk about having an open market and all of that.
02:26Yet Great Britain has oversight on prices.
02:31There is price control to a certain extent
02:33because you have to monitor these things.
02:36Pharmaceuticals is a special commodity
02:38and it has to be treated like that.
02:41In this country, we don't.
02:43Nicole M. Romany, TV6 News.
02:46We'll see you in the next couple of weeks.
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