Alibaba’s Jack Ma calls for laws on counterfeiting to be ‘as tough as those on drunk driving’

E-commerce tycoon Jack Ma Yun has called on Chinese legislators to introduce “laws on counterfeiting as tough as those on drunk driving” as thousands of the country’s governing elite gather in Beijing to set economic and social agendas for the coming year during the NPC and CPPCC meetings, known as the “two sessions”.

In a post on Sina Weibo, often referred to as China’s Twitter, the founder and the executive chairman of Alibaba Group Holding called on authorities to treat counterfeiting with the same imperative as they did when successfully cracking down on drunk driving several years ago.

“Without such strict law enforcement, we would surely see many more traffic accidents. On the contrary, the majority of counterfeiters are not held legally responsible for their actions. Because counterfeiting is such a low-risk crime, it’s hard to imagine how we can effectively rid society of counterfeit goods,” Ma wrote in a Tuesday Weibo post.

Ma called for stricter laws and stiffer penalties against counterfeiting as he believes the prevalence of fakes is hindering China’s innovation, hurting its reputation and threatening the country’s future.

“We need to fight counterfeits the same way we fight drunk driving. For example, if the penalty for even one fake product manufactured or sold was a seven-day prison sentence, the world would look very different, both in terms of intellectual property enforcement and food and drug safety, as well as our ability to foster innovation,” he wrote.

Ma’s post comes a week after Alibaba released a public appeal largely in response to ongoing criticisms about the presence of fake goods on its e-commerce platforms. The Hangzhou-based company owns the South China Morning Post.