Asean Product Liability And Consumer Product Safety Regulation

Consumer product safety is a major contemporary concern for developing, middle-income and developed economies. The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), through its Committee on Consumer Protection (ACCP), has recognised this as a priority topic for international collaboration, as trade in goods accelerates through the region and with its major trading partners world-wide. This paper uncovers already significant harmonisation in substantive product liability law enacted across ASEAN member states. However, strict liability regimes are still missing in several states (both developed and developing) and anyway undermined in practice by problems for consumers in accessing courts or other effective dispute resolution mechanisms, especially for small-value and/or mass claims. Combined with variable media coverage of product safety failures within ASEAN member states, there is scope therefore to enhance minimum standards through generic consumer safety regulation by public authorities. The comparative analysis reveals even more progress in introducing minimum protections, such as powers to ban unsafe goods, set mandatory safety standards, and order or conduct recalls; but some national laws are recent, difficult to enforce or lacking in coverage. In particular, there is a gap across ASEAN member states in terms of requirements on suppliers to notify national regulators even when conducting voluntary recalls, let alone serious accidents and/or risks - as required now in major Asia-Pacific economies as well as in the EU. Reforms to national laws to fill this gap would also help connect ASEAN member state consumer affairs officials with counterparts abroad. There are already growing opportunities to do so via information-sharing and capacity-building provisions increasingly found in FTAs concluded by individual ASEAN member states and ASEAN itself with third countries, and consumer affairs officials should be aware of and involved in such procedures.

Southeast Asia has long been known as a particularly dynamic part of the global economy. In 2007 the leaders of the ten member states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations further agreed to accelerate the project to complete a single market or “ASEAN Economic Community” by the end of 2015. Less well known is that their blueprint also committed to improve and harmonise consumer law, to prevent a regulatory race to the bottom. A new Committee has encouraged member states to enact strict product liability regimes aimed at making it easier for consumers (and sometimes even businesses) to be compensated for harms suffered from unsafe products. ASEAN states have also introduced new or revised laws allowing regulators to set mandatory safety standards before products are put into circulation, and to enforce post-market controls such as bans and recalls of unsafe products.This is the co-editors' Introduction to a conference volume that adds two further introductory chapters to ten country reports detailing these consumer product safety laws, in the context of international and national regulatory structures and dispute resolution systems.

This book looks at the consumer protection offered in a range of Asian countries, for example China, Japan, and South Korea in key areas such as consumer sales law, unfair terms, product liability, and unfair commercial practices. However, it is interesting to note that consumer protection is on the rise everywhere and to compare how this differs depending upon the legal cultures. It is also fascinating to reflect on the influence of models for law reform such as the EU laws. ASEAN has also affected the development of consumer policy for its member states. The book takes the form of national reports which explain the development of the law and also shed light on how the law works in practice. The book also contains thematic reports which look at each area of the law from a comparative perspective. Commentators from around the globe reflect on their impression of Asian consumer law based on their own differing legal systems and benchmarks. A must-read for anyone with an interest in consumer law in Asia and beyond, this book will form the basis of further research and discussion internationally.

The first Western-language research monograph detailing significant developments in consumer law and policy across Southeast Asia. Eight chapters examine consumer law topics within ASEAN member states such as product safety and consumer contracts as well as financial and health services, plus the interface with competition law.

Product Liability is a recognised authority in the field and covers the product liability laws through which manufacturers, retailers, and others may be held liable to compensate persons who are injured, or who incur financial loss, when the products which they manufacture or sell are defective or not fit for their purpose. Product defects may originate in the production process, be one of design, or be grounded in a failure to issue an adequate warning or directions for safe use and practitioners advising business clients or claimants will find this book provides all the necessary information for practitioners to manage a product liability claim. This new edition has been fully updated to take account of 10 years of development in case law and regulation, and the increasing impact of cross-border and transnational sale of goods. The Court of Justice of the European Union handed down major rulings concerning the Product Liability Directive which affect the application of the Directive and national arrangements and Fairgrieve and Goldberg examines this in detail. For any legal practitioner operating in areas which require knowledge of European product liability law, an understanding of the impact of recent developments is essential and this work is an essential resource for practitioners working on product liability, sale of goods, personal injury and negligence. The work provides comprehensive coverage of the law of negligence as it applies to product liability, of the strict liability provisions of the Consumer Protection Act 1987, and of the EU's Product Liability Directive on which the Act is based. Although the majority of cases involve pharmaceuticals and medical devices, in recent English cases the allegedly defective products have been as diverse as a child's buggy, an All Terrain Vehicle, and even a coffee cup. Many cases are brought as group actions, and the book examines the rights of those who are injured by defective products. As well as considering the perspective of the law as it has developed in the UK, this edition contains detailed discussion of case law from other jurisdictions including the USA, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, France and Germany. The coverage in the work is complemented by a full analysis of issues which arise in transnational litigation involving problems of jurisdiction and the choice of laws.