Almost 90 per cent of imported monosodium glutamate (MSG), a flavour enhancer used commonly in Chinese cuisine, is passed off as Ajinomoto in India. The latter is a registered trademark of Ajinomoto Co Inc, a Japanese food ingredients major, which has been operating in the domestic market for the last 10 years. The company imports about 10 per cent of the total 30,000 tonnes of MSG that comes into the country every year.
This rampant counterfeiting of its products prompted Ajinomoto India to issue a public notice on Thursday cautioning those who make copycats to desist from doing so. “The trademark Ajinomoto should not be used while describing or referring to MSG. Any use or reference of the trademark Ajinomoto to the product MSG or any other food items by any other person/party/entity is illegal and wrong,” the notice said, adding those who indulged in the practice would be tried before the court in accordance with the law.
“We find that small manufacturers, who import MSG, tend to use our brand name or come out with products with similar sounding names and packaging that is a lookalike. Obviously, this impacts our business,” says T Manoharan, managing director, Ajinomoto India, declining to indicate the loss to his company on account of these fake products.
MSG is sold in retail outlets in sachets of Rs 2, Rs 5 and Rs 15 and in bigger packs of 500 grams and above. The sachets are primarily targeted at households, while the bigger packs are meant for hotels, restaurants and catering joints. Ajinomoto’s public notice is the latest in a series of counterfeiting episodes that have been bogging fast moving consumer goods companies for a while now.
Almost 15 per cent of consumer goods sales in India is estimated to be of fake products. By value, it stands at about Rs 24,000 crore, according to sector analysts. Despite efforts to curb knock-offs, it remains rampant, especially in rural areas, where consumer awareness is low and the ability to track shipments is poor.
