SUSTAINABILITY CLAIMS AND LABELLING IN THAILAND
Article Sidebar
Main Article Content
Abstract
Sustainability concerns are changing the way the products are made and how they are marketed to the consumers. In other countries, there are implementations of control measure over the practice of advertisement of the products or services that claim to have sustainability values. In Thailand, the practice of self-declared or unqualified claiming or labelling sustainability values by the producers or the marketers may leads to confusion and skepticism over the truthfulness of sustainability value of the products or the production processes, which may eventually dissuade the interest of the consumers in supporting of the sustainable products.
This study finds that the consumer protection law of Thailand is inadequate to resolve the disputes which may arise over the issue of sustainability claims and labelling. By exploring the legal frameworks of the United States of America and the European Union in the area of consumer protection regarding sustainability advertisements, this study concluded that Thailand should issue regulation as the legal control measure in order to protect the rights of consumer and proposed the recommendations of compliance criteria for a regulation on advertising of sustainability values in Thailand.
Article Details
References
Barnett, E. Howard. Green with Envy: The FTC, the EPA, the States, and the Regulation of Environmental Marketing, 1 ENVTL.LAW., 1995.
Barry Dalal-Clayton and Barry Sadler, ‘Strategic Environment Assessment: Sustainability
Appraisal; A Sourcebook and Reference Guide to International Experience’ (2004).
Frank-Martin Belz and Ken Peattie. Sustainability Marketing: A Global Perspective. (2nd Ed.) 2012.
McKenzie, Stephen Social Sustainability: Towards Some Definitions, 2004.
Articles
Alan S. Brown & Larry E. Hepler, “Comparison of Consumer Fraud Statutes Across the Fifty States”, 2005 p 270. available at
European Commission, the, “UCPD Report” available at
Jason J. Czarnezki, “Greenwashing and Self-Declared Seafood Ecolabels”, 28 Tul. Envtl. L J 37 2014. available online at
John Morelli “Environmental Sustainability: A Definition for Environmental Professionals” (2011) Vol 1 Issue 1 Art 2. available at
Joop de Boer,“Sustainability labelling schemes: The logic of their claims and their functions for stakeholders”Business and the Environment, July 2003. published online in Wiley InterScience, DOI: 10.1002/bse.326.
Electronic Media
Consumer International, “The role of consumer protection in meeting the SDGs” available for download at
Report from the Multi-Stakeholder Dialogue, the European Commission, ‘Environmental Claims’ available at
UNEP, “SCP Global Outlook” at 40, available for download at
World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD), ‘Sustainable Consumption Facts and Trends: The Role of the Consumer’ at 15, available for download at