Controls in Advertising: A Vital Move for Russia

Until the beginning of the 1990s, visitors to the Soviet Union immediately noticed the lack of color in the cities. The streets seemed drab to those accustomed to the vivid colors and neon lights of advertising and shop-window displays.Over the past three years advertisements on the streets and in the media have become commonplace in Moscow. Television advertisements are changing from a list read in a monotone to a mix of bright colors, music and graphics. Advertising and public relations have joined the ranks of new professions in Russia. As with all the manifestations of the market, not everyone welcomes this change. A year or so ago there was an attempt to control the use of English in advertisements and the familiar spelling of household-name products was replaced by their cyrillic equivalents.In other respects advertising appears to be unregulated, allowing the unscrupulous to make claims for their goods or services that would not bear close examination. There is no law on advertising, although it is taxed, nor any voluntary body set up by the industry that could produce a code of standards and try to regulate the activities of its members.However, there are restrictions on some kinds of advertising. The Arbitration Chamber, which deals with disputes arising from the publication of information, whether broadcast or printed, has made recommendations to strengthen these restrictions.The advertisement of strong alcohol and tobacco products is forbidden by Russian laws designed to protect the health of the population. Other advertisements may offend against laws that provide for the certification of certain goods, including some food items and pharmaceutical products if they are advertised when they have not been certified. A third category of breaches arises from advertisements for diagnosis and treatment of illness if the processes require certification and are still in the experimental stage or if they are not being tested at all.The Arbitration Chamber recommends that advertisements for strong alcohol and tobacco products should be treated as a breach of the law and that the Procurator's office should take steps to enforce it. The advertising companies and media should check the certificates of goods and treatments that require certification before they conclude a contract with their promoters. It also recommends that a law should be passed to regulate advertising in general but makes no suggestions as to its scope.There is little experience of advertising here on the basis of which consumers can judge the value of the information it offers. Therefore, regulations should be passed to ensure that it is legal, honest and decent and that these standards can be enforced.Marcia Levy, an attorney with Norton Rose, has been practicing law in Moscow for three years.