'Shein and Temu are strangling South African producers and e-tailers'

Lester Kiewit speaks to Michael Lawrence of the National Clothing Retail Federation about the impact of online shopping giants Temu and Shein on local producers.

Listen to the full interview below.

"Anyone bought from Temu?"

That's the very popular question asked by social media users in Mzansi since the Chinese-owned online marketplace arrived in South Africa earlier this year.

The e-commerce site offers a wide range of goods, from furniture to fashion and toys and homewares.

The question follows on the similar 'Anyone bought from Shein?' which dominated Facebook and WhatsApp groups a couple of years back when the Singapore-based fashion retailer landed here.

Shein has been the world's largest fashion retailer since 2022.

Both sites offer such heavily discounted goods that, for some local customers, even the import tax makes buying from the site worth it.

This week Trade and Industry Minister Ebrahim Patel said the government wants to challenge retailers such as Temu and Shein, who he says are using tariff loopholes to unfairly disadvantage South African retailers and producers.

"We understand that they use a process called 'low value goods', and they dont need to charge more than 20% in total of VAT and duty where the normal customer buying through other operations will end up paying somewhere in the region of 60%"

- Michael Lawrence, National Clothing Retail Federation

"We don't have a problem with competition, we don't have a problem with customers having good options, but we do have a problem with the fact that a playing field needs to be levelled."

- Michael Lawrence, National Clothing Retail Federation

Lawrence says his industry must lobby the government to improve its regulation infrastructure and enforcement.

"What we're doing at the moment is having a nuanced and robust conversation with the DTI and SARS to just make sure that there are some changes envisaged."

- Michael Lawrence, National Clothing Retail Federation

Shein and Temu deny allegations of anti-competitive practices.

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Scroll up to the audio player to listen to the interview.