Hong Kong And Guangdong To Boost Copyright Ties

by Mary Swire, for LawAndTax-News.com, Hong Kong

23 June 2006

Hong Kong and Guangdong will bolster cooperation to raise public awareness of intellectual property rights in both places, the SAR's Director of Intellectual Property Stephen Selby announced this week.

The Guangdong-Hong Kong Expert Group on the Protection of Intellectual Property Rights reviewed at its fifth meeting on Thursday the latest developments of intellectual property in the two regions, and concluded that many intellectual property cooperation efforts had been successfully completed.

These included an education-sharing programme held in Nanhai for teachers from primary and secondary schools of both regions, a training and exchange programme for officials of both sides and a seminar organised in Zhanjiang.

Projects for the second half of the year were discussed, including enhancing the intellectual property education-sharing programme for teachers from the primary and secondary schools in both regions, and organising a seminar on intellectual property and the development of small and medium enterprises in Guangdong.

Mr Selby revealed that the expert group has successfully promoted copyright protection in both regions since it was set up in 2003, giving as an example the fact that the proportion of trademark applications mainland enterprises have filed in Hong Kong has increased from 4% in 2003 to 10% last year, of which 40% of the Mainland applicants were from Guangdong.

"We will step up efforts in this area by, for example, conducting talks in Guangdong on the intellectual-property system in Hong Kong," he added.

Guangdong Provincial Intellectual Property Office Director General Li Zhongduo, who led the Guangdong delegation, said the meeting has been fruitful in building up the cooperation of both sides.

"We have agreed to increase our cooperation in both depth and breadth. For example, the 'No Fakes' pledge scheme is continuously to be actively promoted in both regions and research will be conducted on the creative industries of Hong Kong and Guangdong," Mr Li stated.

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