Combating counterfeiting
Counterfeit handbags and watches are a problem. Counterfeit prescription drugs are a serious problem.
In dozens of places around the world, makeshift laboratories are using sugar or wax or worse to produce counterfeit pills that look exactly like real ones. And despite the best efforts of the medical sector, those useless or even dangerous pills reach the markets.
Luckily, work has begun on establishing an early warning system for counterfeit medical products so they never get anywhere near a person who needs the real thing.
But for such a project to succeed, hundreds of stakeholders around the world need to come together: hospitals and pharmaceutical companies, transporters, hardware and software manufacturers, authorities… people who would never be able to agree on a common solution without an organisation like GS1. Present in 108 countries. Working not for profit, but for the benefit of the community.