Sunday, 11 November 2012

AWARENESS OF INTELECTUAL RIGHTS AMONG SMALL INDUSTRY STILL LOW


In Indonesia there were numerous people’s innovative workpieces or creations which were of high sales value. For that matter the people or whoeover created a product must have right of creation, and patent right so their workpieces could not be copied by someone else. Unfortunately people’s awareness and appreciation for intellectual right and the right to claim intellectual right in Indonesia was still low.

In Indonesia the rate of violation of intellectual right (HAKI) was also still high. This was due to low protected system of HAKI and weak control by Government apparatus on the widespread occurrence of intellectual right violation. The Government had done their best to launch illumination campaign for the people about the protection of intellectual right, process of application, and legal sanction to be put on violators.

The Director General of IKM of the Ministry of Industry, Euis Saedah, in Jakarta on Friday (7/9/2012) admitted that the awareness among small and medium industry circles to register their creations were still low so very frequently many cases of dispute busted out. This year the Ministry of Industry set target to register intellectual right of 150 brands and trademarks but only 100 came to apply and only 60 brands passed. “IKM player are not too enthusiastic about applying for HAKI because the procedure of application is quite lengthy and there is a synopsis needed for it” Euis remarked.

And yet according to Euis, the cost for HAKI application was free. Intellectual rights application consisted of copyright, patent right, branding, industrial design, and space planning of integrated circuit. Euis said that she planned to allocate fund of Rp 2 billion to nature local IKM and apply for HKI in 2013. For the most part the fund would be spend on publicizing HAKI to IKM and the importance of patenting their products. Furthermore Euis promised to extend legal assistance for IKM in intellectual rights desputes.

Euis reminded that it was easy for anyone to steal IKM brand in Indonesia as they were not patented. According to Euis copyright was an important matter because someone’s brand could easily be robbed by someone else who would patent the brand. In this case the owner could not use his own name and could not sell his product by that brand. Euis said that the awareness of intellectual right was because IKM never know how to obtain the right. For that matter the Government planned to lauch an illumination campaign to protect IKM from having their brand of creation stolen. The illumination was also meant to motivate IKM small industry to voluntarily patent their product or brand.

HAKI would give legal protection for products invented or branded by the people. Moreover to the businessworld, especially IKM became most important for developing creative economy which was full of competition. She mentioned two benefits offered by HAKI i.e. firstly to give added value to products and be beneficial to other people. Secondly, it would strengthen product competitiveness and at the same time protect every product being released from any attempt of forgery. Hence she expected it would have the impact on economic development which would eventually improve people’s welfare. “I think intensive efforts are necessary to make IKM more concerned about HAKI” she said.

Euis reminded that IKM played an important role in developing people’s economy. The industry proved to be solid and highly resistant to global economic turbulence. Besides, IKM was able to absorb vast labor and evenly spreading people’s income. For that matter, a number of programs had been launched such as pipelining of People’s Business Credit (KUR) stepping up mastery of technology through machinery advancement. Upgrading of human resources quality through training and counseling and quality control as well as food sufficiency must be enhanced whereby to open better access to market.        

 Business News - September 12, 2012

No comments: