Local products for supermarkets must have a barcode
by David Kelleher
Locally-produced items for supermarkets must have a duly-registered barcode or suppliers risk not selling their products. The main supermarket chains have told their suppliers that items without a Maltese barcode will not be accepted after 10 January.
"After 10 January, supermarkets will no longer accept items made in Malta that do not have a Maltese barcode from their suppliers," said Raymond Vassallo, chief executive of EAN (Malta), the local body that regulates the use of barcodes.
Barcoding has been in use for over 40 years, however the article numbering system in Malta is still in its infancy. The EAN has been working hard to get manufacturers and suppliers to use barcodes and its efforts have paid off.
"Barcoding in Malta is used in its basic form - just for retails items and pricing. The majority of products which have a Maltese barcode are off-the-shelve products including groceries, cleaning chemicals and toiletries. But more products such as giftware are also being barcoded," Mr Vassallo told The Malta Business Weekly. The decision taken by the supermarkets will ensure that all products on sale can be traced to their supplier and ultimately, to the manufacturer.
"There have been cases when certain products did not even have the name or address of the manufacturer. This goes against the local labelling law. Certain foreign products also have a barcode but the name of the company is not printed," Mr Vassallo explained.
"Thus barcodes will help supermarkets to know exactly where each product is coming from and who is producing it. We had a case recently where a product was found to be highly toxic. The supplier found that the barcode on the product was fake and therefore became suspicious. Laboratory tests found the product to be toxic and it was taken off the shelves," he added.
Strict methods are used to issue barcodes and each country has it own prefix digit just like the international telephone prefix. The Maltese barcode prefix is 535. Thus all barcoded products in Malta must have the 535 prefix.
EAN has increased its membership by 65 per cent over the past year, yet there are still many who misuse the system. Mr Vassallo said those who abuse of the system fall into three categories:
proper use of numbering and labelling, however product packing does not allow barcode to be read properly
using proper barcode number but of a size that is too small or reduced by more than 20 per cent.
using numbers that should not be used or else reproduced from another product.
Mr Vassallo said packaging caused problems because the barcode was covered in plastic. This reflected light and thus the barcode reader fails to recognise the code.
"Some suppliers or manufacturers, due to the size of the product or shape, have to reduce the barcode. However they reduce it to a size that is not recognised," he said.
"Most of the time, people don't realise that they have to come to us to get their own numbers," adding that serious problems were caused by those who faked the barcodes.
"These individuals or companies do not realise that fake barcodes are easily identified. A barcode reader will recognise a fake code because the last digit is used to verify that barcode. Many simply change the last digit. When this is done the algorithm used to generate the code does not work," Mr Vassallo said.
Over the past year, EAN has identified a number of misused barcodes on local products and is at present considering taking legal action against one individual who faked the local 535 prefix and started using a non-registered number.
"We try and solve the problem between ourselves and the person concerned. If this fails, then we will have to involve the police fraud squad," Mr Vassallo said.
He also warned that trying to use fake foreign barcodes would not work either, even if a barcode used in Honk Kong was copied.
"EAN members are a very close-knit community. We know each other very well and if we have doubts, we just make a phone call. It is not easy to slip through our net," he explained.
EAN (Malta) is a non-profit organisation and holds a number of courses aimed at encouraging businesses to make use of modern technology rather than specific services.
"People have to understand and learn how to use technology in general before they resort to services such as barcoding. Once they feel comfortable with technology they will embrace modern concepts like barcoding," Mr Vassallo said.
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