Intellectual Property Rights Office urged
Bahamas Tribune
Intellectual Property Rights Office urged
By Alison Lowe, Business Reporter
10 December 2010
Caribbean companies will have access to European programs designed to support innovation among small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) under the Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA), according to a CARICOM trade specialist, who yesterday urged that Bahamian businesses should look to offer products or services "with a unique advantage that people are willing to pay a premium price for".
Matthew Spence, an intellectual property specialist, said reform of the Bahamas’ legal framework relating to protection of intellectual property rights will not be "very useful" to Bahamian firms unless they, too, have something to protect, and given that smaller economies will find it harder to compete in a global environment using economies o f scale they should look towards these "unique" areas.
"Strengthening your intellectual property rights when you’re not actually being very innovative is not very useful. If we can’t lower the floor on the requirements (relating to intellectual property under the EPA), then we need to raise the ceiling on our levels of innovation," said Mr Spence, of Caricom’s Office of Trade Negotiations.
Caribbean EPA negotiators were able to ensure that under the provisions of the EPA, Cariforum states and enterprises within them are able to access EU programs that support innovation for SMEs.
"Most may have been designed with European SMEs in mind. Most are competitive tenders for access to those resources. Caribbean entities are now caught within the framework of eligibility for access to that program," said Mr Spence.
Presently, the European Union is making available 3.6 billion euros for a Competitiveness and Innovation Framework Programme, targeting SMEs. The funding cycle comes to a close in 2013.
Cycle
"The discussion of the next cycle of European budget funding is taking place now, so if we want to influence that process and how you become eligible to access that we should really be using diplomatic relations with Europe to influence those discussions," said Mr Spence.
Mr Spence said the Caribbean has traditionally suffered from low growth and low levels of innovation.
"There is low expenditure on research and development, and a strong correlation has been found between expenditure on research and development and economic growth. That’s well established in a lot of work that has been done on innovation, and we are almost off the bottom of the radar when it comes to research and development," said the trade specialist.
However, some firms may already have "unidentified intellectual property" which they have yet to take advantage of, suggested Mr Spence. Intellectual property includes intangible assets over which owners can be granted exclusive rights such as musical, literary, and artistic works; discoveries and inventions; and words, phrases, symbols and designs.
"Many firms don’t realise what they have as having the capacity to generate more revenue from them if they are considered to be intellectual assets. It’s an important aspect of business management that we need to understand a lot more effectively," said Mr Spence.
Under the EPA, the Bahamas will have to beef up its protection of intellectual property rights, with investors needing to know that their creativity, innovation and ’fruits of their minds’ are protected in the Bahamas.
An Intellectual Property Office should be created, said Mr Spence, which will administer/enforce intellectual property rights, and undertake examinations of claims by individuals that they "have the best thing since sliced bread" - that is, should they be afforded protection of their intellectual property rights with respect to a particular innovation.
Going forward, areas in which the Caribbean may have a competitive advantage as it relates to intellectual property include bioceuticals - natural medical remedies - "green" technology and renewable energy, suggested the trade specialist.
"It’s all about capturing the knowledge component of those technologies, not the technology itself - because it’s contribution to our economy may not be large - but if you capture the knowledge, those returns could make much more important contributions to our economies," said Mr Spence.
"I would not be surprised if in the marine environment in the Bahamas there is the kind of algae which could contribute to the future renewable technology."
