58. The representative of the Czech Republic thanked the United States and Japan for having presented their proposal for a multilateral system for the notification and registration of geographical indications for wines and spirits. Her delegation had been pleased to find some similarities with the EC proposal, especially that both proposed systems were voluntary, quite simple, did not impose undue administrative burdens and costs and facilitated the protection of geographical indications. However, her delegation continued to be of the opinion that the additional protection for geographical indications envisaged under Article 23 required a more complex and legally ambitious multilateral system, as set out in the EC proposal. When comparing the two proposals, her delegation had found the EC proposal more effective and truly multilateral. Furthermore, her delegation appreciated that it allowed for the extension of the scope of protection to products other than wines and spirits, which permitted Members to avoid duplication of efforts later during the review provided for under Article 24.2. Creating a database of geographical indications for wines and spirits protected under national legislation and by multilateral agreements could be a first useful step towards a multilateral registration system, but it did not meet the objective under Article 23.4. An opposition procedure and legal effects at the international level were missing in the US/Japanese proposal. In addition, her delegation was not attracted by the suggestion to use collective or certification marks to provide protection for geographical indications. In her delegation's opinion, geographical indications and collective and certification marks – having other attributes – belonged to different systems of protection. The conditions applied to their use were basically different. Her delegation did not think it was possible to integrate the protection of geographical indications into a trademark system, nor could it agree with a methodology which allowed the protection of geographical indications as collective and certification marks in the multilateral system of registration of geographical indications as a rule.
