Nation's first IP legislation led the way in protection

Trademarks have had an enormous impact on business over the past three decades, noted senior officials at a symposium to mark the 30-year anniversary of the Trademark Law of China.

The law "has played a crucial role in boosting the nation's economic and social development, protecting the rights of consumers and maintaining a fair market", said Zhou Bohua, head of the State Administration for Industry and Commerce.

"With the rapid development of the market economy, the concept of trademark protection is now rooted deeply in the Chinese people," said Zhou.

"Today, a trademark is no longer just an indicator of different products, but serves more as the symbol of a company's credibility and competitiveness and as an important strategic resource in national development," he added.

Wang Binying, deputy director-general of the World Intellectual Property Organization, said in a letter to the symposium that the law has "greatly promoted business and trade both domestically and internationally".

The trademark law has boosted international exchanges and cooperation by introducing globally accepted rules in China's intellectual property protection work, said Fang Aiqing, assistant minister of commerce.

In each revision of the law, lawmakers borrowed from overseas experience to "deliver on international commitments while respecting domestic conditions", he said.

As the first intellectual property law in the New China, it "led the way in the nation's IP protection, which was just at its initial stage 30 years ago", said Gan Shaoning, vice-commissioner of the State Intellectual Property Office.

"The establishment of the trademark law provided crucial experience for later patent and copyright laws as well as a number of other IP-related laws and regulations," he said. "With the development of the knowledge economy, intellectual property will be even more valued."

The nation's number of annual trademark applications has grown to around 1.5 million today. Thirty years ago the number was 20,000.

By the end of the first half of this year, the total number of trademark applications in China had grown to 10.54 million. Some 7.17 million trademarks have been registered, 6.06 million of them still valid, figures that top the world.

China is also among the world's top 10 in number of international trademarks in the Madrid system that protects trademarks in several countries with a single approval.

From 1983 to 2011, industry and commerce authorities all over China investigated 715,600 cases involving trademark infringement.

In the past 10 years, courts across the nation heard more than 45,000 civil cases on trademark disputes, which have grown an average annual rate of nearly 40 percent. At the same time, the number of trademark-related criminal cases reached nearly 8,200, average annual growth of 27.9 percent.

In a speech to the symposium, Yan Junqi, vice-chairwoman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, called for closer cooperation among different IP enforcement institutions nationwide.

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(China Daily 08/29/2012 page17)