The nation's top protector of intellectual property rights (IPR) called on the US government to take Taiwan off a list of serious IPR violators after a dramatic drop in US seizures of pirated goods originating here.
Citing a reduction in total goods seized from US$26.5 million in the 12 months to September 2002 to just US$610,000 in the same period ending in September last year, Intellectual Property Office (IPO) Director-General Tsai Lien-sheng (蔡練生) told reporters yesterday that Taiwan should be removed from the Office of the US Trade Representative's Special 301 Priority Watch List, where it has been placed for the past three years.
Tsai was quoting unofficial figures obtained from Taiwan's representatives in the US. The most recent official figures available from US Customs and Border Protection are for the six months to the end of March last year, and stand at US$322,386 in goods seized from Taiwan.
"We feel confident that the chances for being removed from the 301 watch list this year are very good," Tsai said. "Considering the efforts we have made, we hope this year that we can be removed from the list."
The 301 watch list refers specifically to optical media, or movie, music and software disks. It is reviewed each year in April.
US Customs figures show that more than US$23 million in pirated disks from Taiwan were seized in the 12 months to September 2002, representing 88 percent of all goods seized from Taiwan. The unofficial figures show that the figure dropped to just US$23,870 in the fiscal year ended September last year, or just 4 percent of the total.
An advisor to the US government welcomed the news yesterday.
"What we have is an increased effort by the Taiwan government," said Jeffrey Harris, co-chair of the American Chamber of Commerce in Taipei's Intellectual Property Committee. "There has been an impact and I wouldn't be surprised if the figures were down. The Taiwan government is getting results and this shouldn't be ignored. If Taiwan is going to react to US demands, I think the US government should respond in kind."
Harris' European Chamber of Commerce counterpart also welcomed the news.
"A drop sometimes means the criminals are getting better, but when there is such a drastic drop, it can be tied to some success," said John Eastwood, a lawyer at Wenger, Vieli, Belser and co-chairman of the Intellectual Property Committee of the European Chamber of Commerce Taipei. "From our point of view at the European Chamber, the government has been working together with us to create the solutions the rights holders want. The results look more hopeful. My hope is that Taiwan has done enough to get off the Special 301 list."
In response to criticism from the US and other countries that enforcement of IPR here is weak, Taiwan beefed up the enforcement of IPR last year, netting more criminals and counterfeit goods, Tsai said.
Taiwan set up a special 220-person task force last January to target pirated disks. The task force seized NT$662 million worth of disks, and reduced the number of stall holders selling illegal disks by more than half last year, an IPO statement said. The task force has also reduced the number of illegal stores from 300 to 50, according to statistics from the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, which represents the music industry. And regular raids on factories have netted millions of bootleg disks and copying equipment, which can now be confiscated under new police powers.
But the IPO acknowledged that the criminals may have moved house. Two companies busted in December last year took orders in Taiwan, manufactured disks in China and shipped products through Hong Kong. China remains the No. 1 source of pirated disks shipped to the US.
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