D. Suhair bint Sanad Al -Muhannadi
In a qualitative step that reflects an enlightened thought and an advanced future vision, the Ministry of Industry and Trade announced, in cooperation with the Ministry of Youth Affairs, the launch of the National Initiative “Consumer Protection Ambassadors”, targeting the Bahraini youth category from 24 to 30 years, and although this declaration may seem to some within the wave of usual training programs, the in -depth reading reveals a strategic shift in the Bahraini mentality towards a well -based economy and rights Consumer.
The importance of this initiative comes from being not only a training program, but it is a platform for building a new economic generation, conscious, cultured, qualified to protect itself and its society from the dangers of commercial misinformation, the Gulf consumer, and Bahraini in particular, is today facing complex challenges in the digital market. One day, one of the stores refused to hand over a Bahraini consumer of a simple purchase bill, which later deprived him of his right to retrieve a defective product The surprise is that this individual behavior detonated a parliamentary debate, and later led to the compulsory the invoice as a legal document, which turned into an official campaign to protect the consumer and legislative amendment, and other positions in the Gulf states.
According to the statistics of the Consumer Protection Department in Bahrain, more than 35% of the commercial complaints registered during 2024 were the result of the consumer’s ignorance of his legal right or the mechanism for dealing with commercial authorities, and in exchange for these numbers, we find that the consumer awareness constitutes a preliminary shield in front of the practices of fraud and commercial deception, which is what the initiative seeks to qualify and train young people in theory and practically, so that they become real ambassadors for a culture Rashid consumption.
Perhaps one of the most prominent dimensions of the program is that it enhances the strength of the internal market, and the balance between the two parties to the commercial process: consumer and merchant, conscious consumer is not deceived by false offers, does not respond to emotional marketing, and is not involved in deals that lack transparency.
From this standpoint, the initiative contributes to reducing the size of the financial losses incurred by the citizen due to commercial fraud, which was estimated in a modern Gulf study of 1.2 billion dollars annually at the level of the Gulf states combined, and in the same context, the program carries a remarkable forensic dimension, as young people are prepared to engage in a highly complex digital system, and prepare them for a future that relies heavily on cyber skills, and analysis Financial and legal understanding, as the consumer in the digital age does not only need to know the price of the product, but to understand privacy policies, recovery conditions, evaluation mechanisms, and the use of artificial intelligence tools to compare and verify.
What distinguishes the initiative more is that it is fully consistent with the Bahraini economic vision 2030, which is based on competitiveness, sustainability and justice. Protection of the consumer is not only legal, but it is an ethical, economic and societal lever.
We do not lose sight of the legal dimension of this program; Practical training is necessary to include to know the Consumer Protection Law No. (35) for the year 2012, and the associated executive regulations, which enhances human rights understanding among young people, and enables them to implement these laws in the daily reality, and it has been proven that the most affected positions in the transformations of consumer policies in the Gulf were not due to conferences or seminars, but rather thanks to individual youth positions that led boycott campaigns, or have been detonated public opinion issues. Or I responded to exploitative practices in a civilized and legal manner.
Today, this initiative bears more than just training, it is a national project to prepare a conscious “economic citizen”, thinking, analyzing, asking, and comparing.
In the end, granting the title of “Consumer Protection” not only in recognition of efficiency, but it is a declaration from Bahrain to the world that it believes in the capabilities of its youth, invest in their minds, and bet on them to lead the future.
* Media and academic researcher
