At long last the government has deemed it expedient to establish an Intellectual Property Rights Organisation (IPRO), as a regulatory body under the Intellectual Property Rights Ordinance. Placed under the Cabinet Division, it has been made responsible for enforcing international standards for Intellectual Property Rights in Pakistan. As a report appearing in this newspaper on Saturday (April 30), said, besides appointing Munawwar Hameed, and Yasin Tahir, as the first Chairman and Director General respectively of the Policy Board of the organisation, the Prime Minister has accorded approval to the composition of the Board too.
Comprising official and non-official members, representing trade and industry, the legal fraternity and other stakeholders, the Board, which has been described as a public-private partnership, has brought together, on one platform, the Patent Office, Trade Registry and Copyrights Office.
Reference, in the report, has also been made to the seemingly hurried meeting, which the Chairman and the Director General of the Policy Board had on Friday with the Prime Minister who emphasised the significance of the body and its role in the future regimes of trade and industry, saying its formation was an important step toward protecting the interests of business and industry in Pakistan.
All this put together, surely indicates that Pakistan has been vigorously and adroitly striving for fulfilling its obligations under the Intellectual Property Rights, along with other WTO member countries, in the wake of the setback caused at the Cancun ministerial conference. Cancun certainly left a great deal to be desired, particularly for the developing countries, to compensate for which, hectic efforts are being collectively made by them.
However, in so far as the issue of Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights are concerned, the developed nations, have continued to mount pressure on the less advantaged developing nations to do still more. It may be recalled that it was in 2003 that an inter-ministerial meeting had finalised modalities for setting up of the Pakistan Intellectual Property Rights Organisation, for which the federal cabinet had issued instructions while according approval to the trade policy for the year.
It is, another matter that, true to the bureaucratic traditions, the sense of urgency about putting the desired organisation in place was nowhere in evidence in the bureaucracy which, true to its tradition, acted leisurely. However, later the inter-ministerial committee felt that the stipulated organisation could contribute a great deal towards streamlining the regulations, thereby facilitating enforcement of the Intellectual Property Rights in Pakistan. Consequently, it was decided to send a draft bill for vetting to the Law Division after incorporating various proposals from the inter-ministerial meeting. But the matter seems to have rested there, because of three independent offices dealing with matters relating to IPRs, namely, Trade Marks Registry, Patent Office and Copyright Office, which were functioning under the administrative control of three different ministries.
Thus was found to create difficulties in co-ordination, thereby hampering development of an effective system for promotion and protection of IPRs. Two years will thus be seen to have been lost in addressing that predicament. However, now that the organisation has come into existence, one hopes that it will act with the needed speed to make up for the delayed start.
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