Trade Secretary Gregory L. Domingo has urged the United States to strike off the Philippines from its piracy watch list on the back of the aggressive developments made over the past few years on intellectual property rights (IPR) protection.
“I told them there is no reason [for the Philippines to remain on the list]. I came very strong on that issue because I think it’s unfair. I cannot comprehend why we [Philippines] are still on that list,” Domingo told reporters on the sidelines of the Sikat Pinoy National Food Fair last week.
Domingo said he brought up the issue with representatives from the US on the sidelines of the Asean Economic Ministers Meeting last week in Brunei.
The trade chief noted that there was enough justification for the Philippines to be removed from the watch list given the inroads made by the government in implementing the Intellectual Property Code. For one, the Supreme Court has issued new procedures and created a special court for intellectual property cases. The country also has new copyright and trademark laws and has joined the Madrid Protocol.
“In the last two years, we’ve seen things move forward so much in intellectual property,” he added.
According to Domingo, a team from the Office of the US Trade Representative (USTR) was set to conduct a review of the Philippines’ IPR performance by early next year. The USTR is the agency responsible for developing and coordinating US international trade, commodities and direct investment policies.
Early this year, a USTR report showed that the Philippines remained on the US watch list of countries with “underlying IPR problems” such as unauthorized “camcording” of motion pictures in theaters and Internet piracy.
Although the Philippines has promulgated specialized IPR procedural rules that were designed to improve judicial efficiency in IPR cases, the US wanted the country to address piracy over the Internet “with respect to notorious online markets.”
The Philippines just got off the US list of “notorious markets” for pirated products in December 2012.
As of end-July this year, the total value of counterfeit and pirated products seized by the National Committee on Intellectual Property Rights (NCIPR) reached a record high P5.27 billion on the back of the government’s aggressive efforts on IPR enforcement.
Ricardo R. Blancaflor, director general of NCIPR member-agency Intellectual Property Office of the Philippines (IPOPHL), earlier said this figure represented a 95-percent surge from the value of goods seized in the same period last year, proof that the government remained firm in its drive against counterfeiting and piracy.