Advertisements are the pulse of economy: expert

Chennai:

If an investor plans to invest in a country, he should go through the television commercials and print advertisements to understand what is driving the nation’s economy, according to an international expert.

Delivering the inaugural address during national seminar on ‘Contemporary Issues and Challenges in Advertising’, Michael Carter, Australian trade commissioner and consul commercial South Asia said advertisement helps feel the pulse of the consumer behavior of the market and highlighted how brand Australia is being marketed through a promotional mix strategy.

He said that the trade between Australia and India which was initially $14 billion has gone up to $21 billion and is expected to double soon with the free trade agreement soon. He said the Indian investment in Australia is also growing from $11 billion and is expected to double soon.

Earlier, delivering his keynote address former bureaucrat and advisor to the president of the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry and the president of the Indo American Chamber of Commerce, P Murari stressed on the need for self regulation of social media and highlighted the lack of any guidelines to regulate it.

Interestingly, his comments comes in the wake of Press Council of India (PCI) has urging the Government to carry out necessary amendments to bring electronic and social media under its purview.

However, Murari prefers self regulation of media rather than it being regulated. He says its could harm press freedom.

The former bureaucrat also expressed concern over the misuse of advertising by some multinational companies in India. “They would not be carrying out such advertisements in their country as it would violate the Food Safety Standards of their country,” he said while stressing the need for stringent laws to stop it.

Murari also expressed alarm over the malicious advertisements by quacks. He said some mechanism should be evolved to eliminate such advertisements.

He also took potshots on the softdrink and cigarette advertisements. “The advertisement by national icons by promoting these soft drinks is quite misleading. They themselves would think twice of using these soft drinks as it could upset their performance,’ the former bureaucrat said.

He also highlighted that the government imposed ban on smoking has boosted the sales of cigarette manufacturing firms instead of cutting it down. There is a need for the government to rethink on whether banning of smoking advertisements is productive or counter-productive.

Secretary of the college P Haridas, college principal S Narsimhan, head of the college’s department of commerce T S Vembu and seminar director and head department of commerce N Kalyanraman spoke on the occasion.

More than 150 delegates from different parts of the country are taking part in the two-day event, which is organized by post graduate and research department of commerce in Dwarka Doss Goverdhan Doss Vaishnav College along with Federation of Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industry.