The daily light
In recent days, the central office of the communist republic of china and the office of the state council have jointly issued opinions on strengthening protection of intellectual property rights (hereinafter referred to as opinions). This is the first programme document to be issued in the name of the office of the secretary-general to strengthen the protection of intellectual property rights in a comprehensive manner. It sets out the guiding ideas, basic principles and overall objectives for intellectual property protection in the current and future periods, and proposes a series of important policy measures and targeted innovations。
Intellectual property rights (iprs) are an important underpinning for building innovative countries and a central element of a country's participation in global competition. In recent years, the protection of intellectual property rights has been continuously strengthened, and the results are evident, but the “provenness, long-term, high-cost and low-compensation” of rights protections, the poor quality of patent applications, the proliferation of malicious registrations of trademarks and the longer time frame for authorizing review continue to be of widespread concern to society. In addition, the emergence of new technologies, new business practices and new models has created new demands for changes in intellectual property protection regimes。
In the face of new circumstances and problems, secretary-general xi emphasized in his keynote address at the inaugural session of the asian forum in 2018 that strengthening intellectual property protection was “the most important element in improving the system of protection of property rights and the greatest incentive for improving the competitiveness of china's economy” and referred to the importance of intellectual property rights at an unprecedented level, giving them a new dimension to the era and defining new functional positioning. The secretary-general xi's “two most important” statement on intellectual property protection is the opening words of the opinion, which provide a fundamental guide for our future good intellectual property protection. The opinion, which focuses on promoting the modernization of our intellectual property governance system and governance capacity, will have far-reaching implications for our intellectual property work。
Reform of intellectual property governance rules and modernization of governance capacity is always on the way. The emergence of a new technological revolution and industrial change has placed greater demands on intellectual property protection. The opinion proposes further amendments to the three fundamental laws of our country in the field of intellectual property, namely, the copyright act, the trademark act and the patent act, such as the acceleration of the introduction of a system of punitive damages for torts in the area of patents, copyrights, and legislative research to strengthen new forms of intellectual property protection. In addition to substantive law, the opinion proposes to improve the procedural legal system, to develop a judicial interpretation of the rules of evidence in civil proceedings relating to intellectual property and to further the reform of intellectual property justice mechanisms. In 2018, the institutional reform programme of the national intellectual property agency was adopted by the national people's congress, and the restructured national intellectual property authority was responsible for the central management of trademarks, patents, geographical indications of origin and the formalization of a unified and efficient intellectual property administration. This provides a solid basis for furthering the reform of “lenders”, strengthening capacity-building for vetting and deepening the reform of the intellectual property law enforcement system。
The protection of intellectual property rights (iprs) needs to be vigorously promoted. The use of technology to strengthen intellectual property protection has become a social consensus. The opinion calls for the establishment of a system of smart detection of false leads for abuse, the strengthening of intellectual property protection through technological means such as source traceability and online recognition, and the active promotion of the participation of social forces in intellectual property protection governance while legislative, administrative and judicial protection of intellectual property rights is being strengthened. The establishment of a sound social governance model, the improvement of multiple dispute resolution mechanisms for intellectual property rights and the use of a combination of governance instruments to enhance protection will contribute to the overall improvement of protection capacity and standards。
Domestic and international governance of intellectual property needs to be integrated. In the context of economic globalization, the rules of global governance of intellectual property rights are an important element of the international rule of law and global governance systems. In the course of previous developments in the international intellectual property regime, china was unable to participate in the formulation of international rules. At present, china's integrated national capacity is being strengthened and the international position is being significantly enhanced. It is important to strengthen international cooperation. The intellectual property rights regime must play an important role in building a “one-way street” for all. Cooperation and negotiation on intellectual property protection should be strengthened。
After more than 40 years of reform and opening up, china has established a relatively well-developed system of intellectual property protection and has become a major intellectual property power. The opinion focuses on building an “upgrading” of china's intellectual property protection system, which will strongly promote innovation and business excellence, and will once again show the world china's firm and unequivocal stance in strictly protecting intellectual property rights in accordance with the law。
(by wan yong, director and professor, department of intellectual property law, people's university of china law school)
