Special 301 Report: China, India and 5 Others Worst IP Offenders
In its annual report on how foreign countries honor intellectual property protections, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative said Argentina, China, India, Indonesia, Chile, Russia and Venezuela still belong on the list of the worst offenders. Ukraine, which had once been in that group, is not being evaluated because of its invasion by Russia.
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The news release announcing the report said China's progress toward IP protections is slow, with stakeholders still complaining about bad faith trademarks, counterfeiting, forced technology transfer, violation of trade secrets, and its implementation of its amended patent and copyright law. "Also, statements by Chinese officials that tie IP rights to Chinese market dominance still raise strong concerns," the release said. It said that the U.S. is closely monitoring how China is implementing its commitments under the phase one agreement.
It said that India belongs on the priority watch list because of its insufficient protection of trade secrets, its high rates of online piracy and its extensive trademark opposition backlog.
While most of the U.S. concerns are about weak laws on IP, it also is concerned about overzealous IP practices -- only allowing a name for a product if that product came from the place where it first became common, such as champagne from France, or parmesan from Parmigiano Reggiano. The U.S. said China's honoring of these geographical indications is a problem. The release said: "The United States remains concerned about the proposed expansion of the EU GI system beyond agricultural products and foodstuffs to encompass non-agricultural products, including apparel, ceramics, glass, handicrafts, manufactured goods, minerals, salts, stones, and textiles."
There are 20 countries on the watch list for IP concerns -- Algeria, Barbados, Belarus, Bolivia, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, Colombia, Ecuador, Egypt, Guatemala, Mexico, Pakistan, Paraguay, Peru, Thailand, Trinidad and Tobago, Türkiye, Turkmenistan, and Vietnam. The Dominican Republic was removed from that list because it increased enforcement on signal piracy, against counterfeit medicines, and generally increased IP enforcement capacity.