The World Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) Day was celebrated on April 26. The day served up a chilly reminder of the place IPR protection has in national economic discourse, despite the significance of IPR in an increasingly globalised world. That is not because Pakistan is faring brilliantly on this front - quite the contrary.
For instance, the recent edition of the Global Competitiveness Report ranks Pakistan at 106 for its IPR protection regime, much below China (51) and India (63). Moreover, in what is alarming for the countrys exports and international image, Pakistan continues to remain on the IPR Priority Watch List of the United States Trade Representative, for insufficient IPR protection or enforcement.
(The USTR list includes 12 other countries, including China, India, Russia and Canada.)
Its not that Pakistan is lacking legal and institutional frameworks for IPR protection. The country is a member of the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO), which is a specialized United Nations agency responsible for IPR protection. It is signatory to various multilateral treaties, including the World Trade Organisations Trade-related aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (Trips) agreement of 1994.
In addition, laws exist within Pakistan for protection of copyrights, patents and trademarks. The last national assembly enacted the Intellectual Property Organisation (IPO) Act in 2012, which mandated the already-existing Intellectual Property Organization of Pakistan (IPO-Pakistan) to act as a focal organisation for managing the IP related issues and coordinating with various enforcement agencies. IPO-Pakistan has been seen to be actively engaging with the businesses and academia.
It is the issue of awareness of IPR in Pakistan that has to be tackled first and foremost. Awareness shouldn just be about what IPR are about, but also about how their enforcement (or lack thereof) impacts the business growth, value addition, and consumer experience of products and services.
To mark the World IPR day in Pakistan, the United States Embassy organised a panel discussion in Islamabad, precisely to create awareness about IPR-related issues. Among the attendees were people from the public and private sectors, academia and the media. A highly-esteemed panel drawing representation from the legal fraternity as well as pharmaceutical and music industries delivered valuable insights relating to IPR.
There is a general perception that only multinationals need and benefit from IPR protection. However, the panelists dispelled that impression, while arguing that many local, popular businesses (for instance, in the foods business) have failed to expand on the national scene due to lax IPR regime.
If entrepreneurs are to have any future in this country which is buzzing with a youth bulge, then IPR protection must figure in the main economic policies. The panelists noted that all start-ups need IPR protection, especially in the fields of software development and programming - and so do the artists, including musicians and writers, for their creative work.
However, the awareness about IPR is lacking, which the panelists suggested can be increased by making IPR part of the syllabi of business schools, engineering institutes, fashion colleges, etc. IPO-Pakistan was advised to proactively engage with the small and medium sized businesses to apprise them of the value of registering their trademarks with the organisation.
While government and the businesses need to work together to protect IPR in Pakistan, the consumers in the country (which involves just about everybody) can also make a difference here. As consumers, many Pakistanis can be part of the IPR movement, by trying to reward the brains behind creative work (e.g. books, novels, music, etc.) through purchasing the original product and not the counterfeit version.
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