U.S. sees RI making progress in curbing piracy
U.S. sees RI making progress in curbing piracy
Adianto P. Simamora, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The U.S. government acknowledges that Indonesia has been making
significant progress in the protection of intellectual property
rights although the country remains on a watch list, according to
Minister of Industry and Trade Rini M. Soewandi.
"The U.S. sees that we (Indonesia) have made several
improvements," Rini told reporters on Wednesday.
She pointed to the new law and rulings related to the
protection of intellectual property rights, and various campaign
programs to educate businesses.
She added that her office and the police were planning to set
up a special office aimed at handling problems related to piracy
of products.
The U.S. government classifies countries into three categories
according to their performance in intellectual property rights
protection.
The Priority Foreign Country category is given to countries
with the worst conduct in intellectual property rights
protection, followed by Priority Watch List and Watch List
categories.
In the past years, Indonesia has been criticized by the U.S.
for a lack of seriousness in taking firm measures against the
piracy of computer software, video compact discs, books and
infringement of pharmaceutical patents.
Rini said that despite the positive assessment, efforts to
improve intellectual property rights protection must be continued
because the country was still in the Watch List category with a
possible sanction of an embargo against local export products by
the U.S. government.
Meanwhile, marketing director of PT Microsoft Indonesia Ari
Kunwidodo told The Jakarta Post that significant improvements in
intellectual property rights protection could only be judged by
the number of pirated computer software products this year.
He said that based on the Business Software Alliance report,
in 2000, some 89 percent of computer software products here were
pirated.
He said that if piracy activities declined, then there was
improvement in intellectual property rights protection.
Ari urged the House of Representatives to quickly approve the
proposed law on computer software to help curb piracy.