AmCham Ranks Indonesia 39th in Intellectual Property Strength
Jakarta. The US Chamber of Commerce’s Global Intellectual Property Center, or GIPC, has put Indonesia on 39th place out of 45 economies in the US Chamber International IP Index.
The index calculates the role of intellectual property (IP) in facilitating innovation and creativity in a country’s output and development by calculating 35 indicators in six categories, namely patents, copyrights, trademarks, trade secrets and market access, enforcement and membership and ratification of international treaties.
This year, the report centers its study on the link between IP and innovation, titling the study "The Roots of Innovation."
"Indonesia’s intellectual property policies present challenges to domestic innovators as well as outside investors," GPIC executive director, Patrick Kilbride, said during the report's launch in Jakarta on Wednesday (22/02).
"It continues to be a challenging environment for copyright-reliant creative industries; meanwhile, the implementation of Indonesia’s new Patent Law provides an important inflection point for R&D-based businesses."
According to Kilbride, Indonesia's intellectual property protection has improved since last year due to the strength of its trademark law but the country still has a lot of work to do to improve competitiveness compared to its regional counterparts.
Thailand and India are placed 40th and 43rd on the index respectively. Indonesia was outranked by Vietnam (37th), Brunei (29th), Malaysia (19th) and Singapore (8th).
The top 5 on the list were the US, UK, Germany, Japan and Sweden.
Kilbride said there is a strong correlation between trade agreements and IPR.
The director said that if a country does the minimum implementation of the necessary World Trade Organizations’s Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, or TRIPS agreement, they would score at least 16.6 out of 35 indicators, while signing on for the Trans-Pacific Partnership, or TPP, agreement would boost that score to an average of 25.
"Joining some of the international treaties that help set standards to show that the country wants to be part of the multilateral consensus is an easy way to climb up the ladder in this index," Kilbride suggested, adding that Indonesia could be best served by joining the World Intellectual Property Organization’s Internet treaty for a start.
"Countries that invest in stronger IP have better access to new technology and creative content, […] intellectual property strength translates to better access to capital, whether it is for startups, venture capital, crowdsourcing or simply to get a loan," Kilbride said.
This year's index is the fifth rolled out by the GIPC since 2012.
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