I have been reading the renewed calls for modernized intellectual property legislation with great interest and admittedly, with some wry amusement. Some of us have been yelling and screaming about this for years. We have either been ignored by the powers that be or gotten a placatory response that the policy makers are now reviewing it, beginning consultations with the relevant stakeholders and so on, so on and so forth. I am not making this point to get into a debate about who started the effort first but to begin to illustrate the level of interest and response I have experienced on this subject over the years.
Intellectual property legislation was inherited from the British at independence and quite frankly I have not seen any evidence to suggest that any further or significant attention has been paid ever since. And so through the years we went merrily along stealing television signals, copying CDs and DVDs and photocopying books or parts thereof. Some of these activities of course have become thriving businesses and God forbid anyone suggest that we prevent our citizens a making a dollar. We now have what can be called distributed networks with carts moving around the city center and further afield filled with CDs for sale. In fact our friends and family in the diaspora have been able to come to Guyana and purchase voluminous amounts of music at a price that they would never get in the United States. Apparently our American brothers and sisters frown very deeply on this kind of activity.
When these matters are brought for discussion there is the usual push back. What do you want us to do chief? We cannot afford to consistently pay for original CDs and DVDs. Have you seen the price of original books comrade? During the brouhaha in the early part of this decade when it was alleged the Government of Guyana was purchasing photocopied books, the spirited defense was how do we expect poor people’s children to get an education if we do not do this? (Never mind the question why we are still poor but let’s move on) This response did not go down well. Private sector organizations like the Georgetown Chamber of Commerce and Industry and others publicly raised their objections to the practice. The publishers and local booksellers had also enough of this state of affairs and threatened lawsuits. There was talk of a negotiated settlement which included the Government producing books under a licensed arrangement with the publishers. This has however, disappeared off the headlines. I cannot speak for schoolbooks but certainly copy of other types of material has continued unabated.
So here we are in 2015 and the creative industries sector has publicly raised the issue of modernized intellectual property legislation. The Government of Guyana has indicated that they would like have this done within a year and will begin consultations with the relevant stakeholders. I am not quite sure why we need further consultations. I think it has already been established that the modernization needs to be done. The World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO), who tried this in Guyana previously, would be more than willing to assist. Granted there are many layers to this and there is a need to a comprehensive, national approach but the first order of business must be to upgrade the legalization.
There also needs to be a greater understanding and appreciation of the issues that we are dealing with. Intellectual property by definition, consists of ideas, concepts, insignia and symbols that are unique to the owner. The concept is best thought as of as bundle of rights protected by law. Trade Secrets, know-how and expertise are instance of company information that is also protected by IP law. In the simplest terms any idea or concept that you create and attempt to bring to market must be protected by law. It applies to everything. If someone for example, takes a Mashramani costume design to a business or Government entity for them to consider using it during the celebrations. There must be a level of legal protection to prevent the entity from using the design after they decline the designer’s proposal.
As stated previously and by others, our current IP laws are based on the 1956 British legation. It should be noted however that despite this, Guyana has happily signed on to the Paris Convention for the protection of Industrial property and the Berne Convention for the protection of literacy and artistic works. Guyana as a signatory to the World Trade Organisation (WTO) should have been compliant with the Trade Related Aspects of the Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) agreement since 2006.
This is not about being sanctimonious and taking the moral high ground, as stated earlier, there is simply a need for a comprehensive, national approach to the modernization of this legislation and I daresay many others. We are seeking to grow and nature 21st century industries so this is more critical than ever. Creative industries are going through unprecedented economic and artistic growth which has led it to be one of the largest industries worldwide over the last 10 years. Our local industry cannot be prevented from participating fully in this because of outdated legislation. Our future in other intellectual outputs such as software development, business process outsourcing and product design will also be benefit from this effort.
Countries like Jamaica and Trinidad & Tobago benefit from more up market investment because they have enforceable intellectual property regimes that provide a level of comfort that encourage company to invest in ICT and related knowledge based industries. Technology licensing revenues are estimated to amount over $80 billion in the U.S. and over $120 billion worldwide. Intellectual property therefore must be a primary economic interest for us.
There will always be social and economic questions about the impact of this kind of initiative. We will argue about cost, affordability and threats to existing livelihoods etc. We have to cross all those bridges but I will continue to argue that under the new paradigm we can open the floodgate in terms of potential income and improve revenues generation and overall standard of living for us all.
Wanderings of a Beautful Mind 