March 15th is World Consumer Rights Day—to raise global awareness about consumer rights and needs, and to demand respect and protection for all consumers.
In China, the day is marked by a two-hour prime-time show on state-run China Central Television (CCTV), where brands are publicly criticized for issues like poor-quality products, robocalls, and illegal collection of personal information. Reporters often would spend months or even years under disguise in those problematic industries to finally unveil the truth on this day. Many famous industries’ problems have been addressed in this channel.
Here is a Chinese article about all that is covered this year. FYI, topics include:
- Refurbished period pads
- Disposable underwear made by hand without sterilization
- Fraudulent plumber platform
- Water-retaining frozen shrimp have more water than action shrimp, and Phosphate content blows high.
- Usury undercover in online finance management platforms
- Stolen personal privacy from reel platforms.
- Nuisance call industry.
- Mobile phone lottery actually requires more money invested.
- Disqualified electricity lines sold at discount prices.
Many exposed problematic phenomena have some economic insights in it—after all, theses are all consumer-right related. It’s good to know!