Crackdown on piracy firm and unshakable

At a press conference held by the Information Office of the State Council on June 28 Zhang Zhigang, director of the State IPR Protection Working Group Office and Vice Minister of Commerce, said China's position on intellectual property rights protection and crackdown on piracy is consistent and firm, and the work would never stop.

On June 30 the leading group for enacting China's IPR strategy held its first meeting, officially starting the work of national IPR strategy enaction. Wu Yi, Vice Premier and head of the group, said the enaction of national IPR strategy is the practical demand of China's reform and opening up, economic and social development. It is a pressing task of actively responding to the challenge brought about by the IPR international rules reform and safeguarding China's national interests and economic security, which will help facilitate the establishment of a market environment of fair competition.

In less than a year since September 2004 when the Chinese government launched a special IPR protection campaign, 24,000 trademark infringement cases have been investigated and handled, 167 million pirate audio/video products have been confiscated, 24 illegal CD production lines have been closed down and over 2,600 IPR infringement suspects have been investigated.

Visiting Beijing Silk Market

The Silk Market in Beijing, apart from selling China's specialty - silk cloths, was also known for selling cheap fake garments. Some foreign tourists shopping in the Silk Market also did so to get fake name-brand garments.

In 2001 the Beijing industrial and commercial administrative authorities ordered a stop to selling fake name-brand garments such as those imitating Nike and Adidas in the Silk Market. In July 2004, after consulting with some international name-brand producers, the same authorities issued a No.1 notice requesting all garment wholesale markets and small commodity markets in Beijing to refrain from selling products faking name brands such as Louis Vuitton, Prada, Chanel and Burberry. In March 2005 the authorities issued a No.2 notice adding to the list brands such as Montblanc, Dunhill, Cartier, Piaget, Vacheron Constantin, Omega, Estee Lauder, CD, Gucci and Hermes. The notice pointed out that those who continued to sell fake products bearing these trademarks in the market would be investigated as trademark infringement cases. Those suspected of constituting crimes would be transferred to public security departments for further investigation and those who repeatedly sell these products would be uprooted from the market.

The Silk Market was transformed from an open market to an indoor one in 2005. On April 4 industrial and commercial administrative authorities in Chaoyang district, Beijing made a large-scale inspection on the new Silk Market, confiscating fake name-brand garments of over 600 pieces, dozens of shoes and 200-odd wrist watches.

The reporter recently made an inspection on the new Silk Market also, noticing the Trademark Law posted in front of the front gate. Inside the market fake garments, shoes, suitcases and handbags had disappeared. There were, however, some watch emulations displayed in the open such as those of Patek Philippe, Rolex, Omega and IWC. It was learned that some proprietors were still selling these in suitcases, which could be moved to somewhere else quickly at the slightest alarm.

As a matter of fact, more and more newly affluent Chinese feel distained to cast a look at fake famous watches, as reflected by few customers in the watch section of the new Silk Market. Switzerland's largest watch group Richemont said the group would sell 7.5 million Swiss watches in China in 2005, totaling $700 million.

A war of patience and persistence

Several months of special IPR protection campaign launched by the Chinese government have left much less pirate CDs on the Beijing market. The report found out in some audio/video product stores in Xicheng and Chaoyang district that various pirate movie and music DVDs used to be available in abundance were withdrawn from the shelves, with the owners idling about and very few customer inquries. Large audio/video product stores and bookstores such as the Xidan Book Building and Dashijie Audio/Video Product Store that sell only authentic CDs, on the other hand, were filled with customers. The sale channels of pirate movie DVDs have shifted to street vagrant vendors.

The phenomenon indicates on one hand that the crackdown on piracy has proved effective, and on the other the supply source and channels of pirate CDs have not been completely cut off. As soon as the effort is eased up there will be a rebound. This is a war of patience and persistence.

In fact, victims of pirate CDs are not limited only to the Hollywood magnates. Popular moves directed by renowned Chinese directors are also suffering from piracy. How to protect their legal interests is also a lasting pain for Chinese filmmakers. Guangdong Flyland Movie & Video Production Ltd started a nationwide crackdown on piracy in the latter half of 2004 and about a thousand businesses selling pirates have been sued so far.

IPR protection is a new subject for a China of thousands of years of history. For the Chinese government IPR protection is now an unalterable policy. For ordinary people, however, they are concerned more about the price. An imported DVD costs as much as more than 200 yuan while a pirate CD costs only 8 yuan. It was reported that Warner Home Video this year released DVDs of Looney Tunes: Back in Action, Catwoman and Troy, reducing the price to 22 - 28 yuan in a bid to squeeze the market of pirate CDs.

While crackdown on piracy never stops people expect more measures released to promote the sale of authentic CDs.

By People's Daily Online