The First Joint Plenary Meeting of the EU Observatory on Counterfeiting and Piracy took place in Madrid on 10 June 2010.
After a short introduction on behalf of the Spanish Presidency by the Director General of the Spanish Patent and Trademark Office, Mr. Alberto Casado Cerviño, Mrs. Margot Fröhlinger (European Commission, DG MARKT) reaffirmed the Observatory’s ambition to assess the scope, scale and impact of counterfeiting and piracy in the European Union and the strategy, plans, structure and areas of work of the Observatory.
Mr. Piotr Stryszowski (OECD) summarised the conclusions of the OECD 2008 Study on counterfeiting and piracy. His presentation was followed by an overview by Mr. Chris Oldknow (a corporate attorney at Microsoft working on policy issues related to counterfeiting and piracy) of the ICC/BASCAP follow-up work with the OECD on this Study.
This was followed by two presentations from Mrs. Soledad Rodríguez Antón (Secretary General of the Spanish Asociación Nacional de Defensa de la Marca (ANDEMA)) and Mrs. Paloma Castro (AUTHENTICS FOUNDATION) regarding consumer awareness campaigns and activities related to consumer attitudes towards counterfeiting. Mr. Paul Fournier (Trade Advisor at EUROCHAMBRES) dealt with the “Transatlantic IPR Collaboration Project: A study on the subject of counterfeiting and piracy with special emphasis on policy approaches in the EU and the US”. Finally, Mr. Ramon van Barneveld (European Commission, DG Markt) summarised a recent Eurobarometer report from March 2010 concerning consumer perceptions of counterfeiting and piracy in the EU.
The morning session ended with a brief report by Ted Shapiro and Ann-Charlotte Söderlund on the progress of the work of the Sub-Group on Legal Framework.
In the afternoon, Mrs. Margot Fröhlinger povided for an update on the Stakeholders’ Dialogues on the sale of counterfeit goods over the Internet and on illegal Internet uploading and downloading.
Next, Dr. Miklós Bendzsel (President of the Hungarian Patent Office), Mrs. Monica Pop (Chief Prosecutor, Romania) and Mr. Javier Moreno Ramos (Director of the Department of Legal Coordination and International Relations, Spanish Patent and Trademark Office) gave an overview of the structures and strategies in place in their jurisdictions to fight against counterfeiting and piracy.
The Joint Session closed with a general discussion about the Collaboration and Information Exchange, recommendations on the way forward, administrative structures and frameworks.
