The Guidelines on Consumer Protection: Business Engagement and the accompanying analysis are based on a range of sources as well as exchanges with colleagues in the MENA (Middle East and North Africa) region.
The sources include the 2015 Inception Report and survey data from some of the countries, provided to UNCTAD secretariat. These are set in the context of the United Nations Guidelines for Consumer Protection first drafted in 1985 expanded in 1999, and most recently revised in 2015.
Other UNCTAD sources are used, in particular the Manual on Consumer Protection, first published 2004 and later revised in 2016-17. It was then published as a provisional advance copy for the UNCTAD Ministerial Conference in July 2016.
The analysis of legislation is heavily concentrated on consumer protection acts in the countries studied, namely: Algeria, Egypt, jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Tunisia and the State of Palestine.
Readers are advised that other legislation, covering particular sectors will also contains protections for consumers. However, although such legislation is referred to wherever possible, it is too extensive to be subjected to the same levels of detailed analysis. Of note, it is possible that some inaccuracies may occur due to the translation of documents from Arabic into English and or French. These languages are the main ones in which the consumer protection team is working.
The present guidelines are accompanied by a sister volume of Guidelines on Consumer Protection: Agency Structure and Effectiveness in MENA Region.
They also from part of a series which includes:
Readers are recommended to refer to those publications whenever possible.
