'Copyright bill needed for globalization'

JAKARTA (JP): Minister of Justice Oetojo Oesman said yesterday the government-sponsored bills on copyright, patents and trademarks were needed to anticipate globalization and free trade.

Speaking at a plenary session of the House of Representatives, Oetojo said the government had adjusted the contents of the bills to that of international laws, particularly the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT)'s Agreement on Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPs).

"If the bills do not conform with international regulations, Indonesia will have difficulty when facing economic problems on an international level," Oetojo said.

TRIPs comprises norms and standards for the protection of intellectual creations - including copyright, patents, trademarks, industrial product designs, trade secrets, and electronic integrated circuits.

TRIPs is based on international agreements on intellectual property rights such as the Bern Convention, the Paris Convention, and the Washington Tract.

Indonesia is not a member of the Bern Convention, but a member of the Paris Convention, although with reservations. A number of industrial countries, like the United States, European countries and Australia, have made bilateral agreements on TRIPs with Indonesia to protect their products from TRIPs violations here.

Yesterday's session was the third round of talks during which Oetojo responded to legislators' views and questions on the bills.

The government last month submitted three bills for revision of current laws on copyright, patents and trademarks to the House of Representatives for its next deliberation session.

Oetojo said the revision was needed as a consequence of Indonesia's 1994 ratification of the TRIPs.

The soon to-be-revised laws are Law No. 6/1982 on Copyright, Law No. 6/1989 on Patents, and Law No. 19/1992 on Trademarks.

Responding to questions on the copyright bill, Oetojo said the copyright of products whose inventors were unknown would be held by the state until a person claimed -- and managed to prove -- he or she was the inventor of that product.

"It is hard to determine how long the copyright of a product may be held by the state," Oetojo said.

He explained that the copyright bill's clause on a 50-year protection period for computer programs was expected to create a conducive climate for computer programmers and inventors to boost their creativity.

"Interminable moral protection (towards inventors) is limited to the right to imprint an inventor's name or identity, including a pseudonym, on a product," he said.

On the patents bill, Oetojo said a product could be considered new if, at the time a patent was requested, the product was not the same or was not a part of an earlier invention.

"This also means a product can be considered new if it has never been endorsed both verbally and in writing," he said.

He said if the product was a continuation of an earlier invention it could also be considered new. However, he added, products like these must also meet several other criteria.

According to the ministry's data, requests for patents between 1991 and 1996 totaled 17,068. Of this, 481 were domestic requests and 16,587 were foreign.

A survey disclosed last month Indonesia was one of the world's greatest software pirates with a 98 percent strike rate, stealing US$150 million in 1995 from software producers worldwide.

Indonesia was second to Vietnam; China and Oman were third with a 96 percent piracy rate.

Losses from worldwide software piracy reached $13.1 billion in 1995, up 9 percent on 1994's $12.2 billion.

Losses from piracy in the Asia-Pacific region were estimated at $3.9 billion, with Japan reporting losses of more than $1.6 billion. (pwn)