August 18, 2007	Saturday	Sha’aban 4, 1428

KARACHI, Aug 17: The Chinese-dominated local toy market has not yet felt any impact of recalling of over 18 million Chinese-made toys worldwide by the United States’ biggest toy-maker Mattel, citing these toys contain hazardous lead paint and magnets.

Neither the consumers nor the importers/retailers here have shown any awareness about the world’s largest ever recall of toys on quality concerns.

Chinese toys have virtually captured 100pc market share in Pakistan which was 90 per cent in 2003. Cheap prices and large variety of designs have made buyers wild for these toys. However, some local organised toy-makers have closed down their units after having lost competitive edge against cheap Chinese products.

Local importers are divided over the actual market share of Mattel products in the market. A Chinese toy importer in Gul Centre says Mattel has less than one per cent share and its products find their way into the local market via Dubai through agents. “So far consumers have not stopped buying Mattel toys,” he added.

He said that there was no sole authorised distributor of these branded world-class toys which are only available in shopping malls of posh areas and are hardly found in regular toy stores.

Another importer Mohamamd Amin Bantwa said that Mattel had 10 per cent market share. “It is at least 200 per cent costly because of high quality and finishing as compared with B category Chinese toys”.

He said that there had been no awareness among consumers about Mattel’s China-made products because these toys were available in small numbers here. “Local buyers are more price conscious rather than quality conscious”.

Imran Saeed Baghpati, a toy merchant in Bahadurabad, said that consumers had not shown any sign of panic over the reports of Mattel’s decision of recalling Chinese-made toys.

He said quality did not matter for buyers as they were more interested in procuring low-cost toys for their kids. “There are many cheap-quality Chinese toys which are giving pungent smell with fading colour, but parents seem unaware how dangerous it is for their child safety.”

“In Europe and America parents always purchase ‘A’ category Chinese toys to avoid any hazardous impact on their children’s health,” he added.

Merchants say it is hard to give exact sales volume of Chinese toys on monthly or daily basis, but they believe that 8-10 containers of 40ft (carrying 5,000-6,000 kg of toys) arrive in Karachi alone every month.

They said that the price of Chinese toys had become costlier by 30 per cent in the last one and a half years due to increase in plastic prices on world markets, rising currency difference and increase in freight rates to $4,200 per container as compared to $2,100 a year back.

However, in China, labor rates and utility charges are cheap as compared to Pakistan and the Chinese government also provides incentives to their export-oriented industries like free power for five years with no taxes in order to increase competitiveness of finished goods on international markets.

They said that the cost of a duty-paid container of 40ft now rose to Rs1.2-1.3 million as compared to Rs0.7-0.8 million.

They added that despite a cumulative impact of 58pc in duties and taxes for import of toys there had been hardly any smuggling but under-invoicing was taking place. “Toys’ smuggling is more risky as they are breakable items”.

In 1990, local toys enjoyed 75 per cent market share with three makers in organised sector and other players in the informal sector.

They said that organised sector toy-makers had already closed down their units, while some makers in cottage industry were still producing low-quality toys by stealing designs of branded-Chinese items.

The price of Chinese mechanical and battery operated toys ranges between Rs150 to Rs2,000, while the prices of plastic toys hover between Rs30-500 and the rates of PVC items rubber toys range between Rs60 to Rs100.