Minutes - TRIPS Council - View details of the intervention/statement

Ambassador C. Trevor Clarke (Barbados)
C TRANSITIONAL REVIEW UNDER SECTION 18 OF THE PROTOCOL ON THE ACCESSION OF THE PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF CHINA
80. The representative of Canada thanked China for its responses to Members' questions and the documents it had provided, giving details of some of the measures and legislation that had been implemented by China. Canada and China were engaged in continuous bilateral exchanges of best practices and other experiences by their respective intellectual property agencies and IP experts. In the course of this exchange, Canada was welcoming a Chinese delegation from the Yunnan Intellectual Property Office in the same week and, as part of the Canada-China WTO Capacity Building Project, a study tour the following month of senior officials from the provincial offices of the Chinese Ministry of Commerce. 81. Canada followed China's work on its legal framework for the protection and enforcement of IPRs with great interest and, while recognizing progress in relation to trademark protection in the last couple of years, remained concerned by some of the key issues with respect to enforcement. These concerns were confirmed in a recent survey of Canadian businesses, industry groups, right holders and other interested stakeholders, which had been conducted in order to identify the countries where stakeholders were encountering problems with enforcement and how these problems were affecting them commercially. Almost two thirds of the submissions had raised concerns with China, covering equally the infringement of patents, trademarks, copyright, and industrial designs in products ranging from building materials, circuit breakers, electrical devices and electronics to batteries, toys, apparel, luxury goods, Inuit themed gift items, and works of art. Disconcertingly, almost all of the submissions that had raised concerns with China noted that they had not initiated enforcement procedures in China, citing a variety of reasons including the difficulty of pursuing remedies, the unlikelihood of a satisfactory result, extensive bureaucracy, the absence of effective sanctions, high costs with slim chances of success, and difficulties in gaining support and action from the Chinese authorities. In addition, increasing concerns about copyright enforcement in China had been raised by a number of Canadian groups, including recording artists, film companies and video game developers. 82. In this respect, Canada was particularly interested in the indications by China's Premier that China would improve mechanisms for IPR protection and strengthen law enforcement, and shared other Members' concerns regarding the thresholds for criminal prosecution that had been established by China's Supreme People's Court in 2004. Canada was further interested to hear that one of the activities of the State Working Group on IPR Protection established in August 2004 was to conduct public awareness and education campaigns. Canada would be interested in any further examples of recent IP public awareness campaigns that China could provide. Canada also shared the interest of other Members who had raised detailed questions, and was looking forward to continuing this dialogue.
IP/C/M/52