As criminals become increasingly sophisticated, a crime-fighting initiative has called for a collaborative approach across businesses and industries to address the issue. According to Abrie Nelson, head of the Consumer Goods Crime Risk Initiative, an undertaking of the Consumer Goods Council of South Africa, crime is a noncompetitive issue that requires collaboration. With fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) often targeted for their high value, a collective and pro-active response had proven to be the most successful in fighting crime
affecting the industry, said Nelson. “Whilst companies deploy both unilateral and bilateral steps to combat crime in their operations, ultimate success in the fight against crime requires a coordinated approach across the industry,” said Nelson. “Information sharing and analysis, as well as the adoption of industry best practice, forms the basis of an effective mitigation strategy, while cooperation and alignment with all relevant stakeholders, including competitors, other industries and government are central to its success.” Considering the importance of the consumer goods industry – a significant component of the national economy that contributes 18.5 % of the Gross Domestic Product, R18.6 billion towards taxes, R89 billion towards exports and employs some 2.9 million people – the impact of crime is severe. Hijackings, armed robberies, theft and other crimes remain amongst the top threats to the FMCG industry. “Working together as a retail industry our main objective is to address operational and security risks through information sharing, cooperation and purposeful action,” explained Nelson. The emphasis, he said, was on the collection, analysis and sharing of incident and preventative risk information with a view to informing better preventative and reactive strategies by members and other stakeholders as well as forging cooperation across the industry and with all stakeholders in government especially the SAPS and NPA.
Crime is a noncompetitive issue that requires collaboration. – Abrie Nelson
