The World Intellectual Property Organization celebrates, on April 26 every year, the World Intellectual Property Day, to highlight the role that intellectual property plays in encouraging innovation and creativity.
In Qatar, the Ministry of Commerce and Industry (MOCI), through the Intellectual Property Rights Protection Department, works to protect the rights of innovators and inventors, and is making great efforts to communicate its initiatives to the public in the field of intellectual property rights protection, and to clarify the laws and legislation that have been issued to protect these rights. It reviews the most prominent electronic services that it provides in this field, introducing patent registration mechanisms, the followed procedures, and cooperating with the World Intellectual Property Organization regarding the establishment of technology and innovation support centers.
Director of the Intellectual Property Rights Protection Department at the Ministry of Commerce and Industry Amna Jaber Al Kuwari, said in a statement to QNA that the celebration of intellectual property rights every year is an affirmation of the importance of these rights and their role in supporting innovation and creativity as a product of the human mind, emphasizing that intellectual property rights protection systems guarantee the rights of young innovators and constitute an incentive for them to ensure that the benefits of their innovations are spread to the local community.
She added that the importance of celebrating the World Intellectual Property Day increases with the technological development that we are witnessing in the world today, the challenges of e-commerce, the different forms of service provision and the Internet, and the role of young people in facing these challenges and providing them with original works based on intellectual property rights, such as trademarks, patents, industrial designs and copyrights.
She also revealed that the administration receives requests for registration and preservation of intellectual property rights from individual citizens and companies alike, as well as the case for foreign investors, whether resident or non-resident in the country, and in all fields, and the number of applications submitted to protect trademarks for the year 2021, from locals, reached 1422 applications, and the number of applications submitted by foreigners was 7,983 applications for registering a trademark.
Al Kuwari added that the number of patent applications submitted through the Patent Cooperation Treaty amounted to 665, and the number of applications submitted directly to the Office was 91 patent applications (both local and foreign), while the number of copyright protection applications for the year 2021, which were registered, reached 262, and the number of inspection campaigns carried out by the Department to enforce intellectual property rights in the field of trademarks reached 29 campaigns, which resulted in the registration of 17 violations.
Regarding whether laws are sufficient to protect intellectual property rights, and to what extent laws are applied to those who infringe intellectual property, Al Kuwari said that in Qatar, the legislative system is a modern system and keeps pace with international best practices in this field. The states accession to a set of international agreements, such as the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) administered by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), constitutes an important gateway for the local Qatari inventor and an attractive factor for foreign investments based on patent protection and the penalties stipulated in national laws constitute a deterrent to the infringer on intellectual property rights.
For his part, the Director of Business Development at the Industry Development Office at Qatar Foundation Ahmed Ali Al Khanji, said that knowing the basics of developing and protecting intellectual property is one of the tools that enable young people to realize their aspirations for a better future.
Al-Khanji added that the protection of intellectual property rights is an exclusive contract between the individual and the state (the market) in which he registers the protection, and this right is guaranteed to him in manufacturing, marketing and competition legally
On the way to create a generation that is aware of its responsibilities and achieve its aspirations, and to what extent laws are applied to those who infringe intellectual property, Al-Khanji said that this is achieved by spreading a culture of intellectual property and innovation in school curricula.
