Brazil can help Portuguese-speaking countries in consumer protection – 04/04/2023 – Maria Inês Dolci

Lusophone countries, that is, those that speak Portuguese –with the exception of Portugal– need a lot of support from Brazil in the development of consumer protection and citizenship. In countries like Angola, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, São Tomé and Príncipe, Macau and Timor-Leste, there is great difficulty in legislation and compliance with laws in basic matters such as health, electricity, telecommunications and internet access, credit , financial operations and food inspection.

As president of Consumare (International Organization of Portuguese-speaking Consumer Associations), I was in contact with these demands during an in-person ordinary general meeting, last March 29, at the organization’s headquarters, in Lisbon.

The conclusion of the debates and presentations was that Portuguese-speaking countries must cooperate with each other to improve their realities in the defense of consumer rights. In some of these countries there is already a legal framework for this area, but it lacks regulation. In others, there isn’t even that.

Although Brazil also faces major challenges, such as socioeconomic and infrastructure inequality, we have the CDC (Consumer Defense Code), the SDC (National Consumer Defense System), the public ombudsman networks, the Marco Civil Law of the Internet, the Law of Over-indebtedness, the LGPD (General Law for the Protection of Personal Data)) and with the Statute of the Elderly.

We have Sindec (National Consumer Defense Information System), which brings together data from 27 states, 855 cities, 738 Procons and 1,183 service stations. And I believe it will advance the debate towards the creation of the General Law on Artificial Intelligence.

This knowledge, experience and legal framework could help Portuguese-speaking countries to develop their own laws and bodies based on the successful example of the largest Portuguese-speaking country, Brazil.

As I highlighted at the beginning of this text, Portugal already has an excellent structure for consumer protection and for strengthening citizenship.

In other countries, dedicated and courageous pioneers carry on this fight for consumer rights, but their associations are short of personnel and financial resources. And they do not find in their countries the legal instruments that we have here.

Since we are no longer international pariahs due to environmental destruction and the denial of vaccines in force until last year, in addition to other issues, we could approach the Portuguese-speaking countries, our brothers, to collaborate with their consumers (citizens), who also deserve more quality of life and respect for their rights.

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