LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton SA, L'Oreal SA and other French companies lose a combined US$10 billion a year to copyright, patent and trademark theft, a French official said, pointing to Chinese counterfeiters as major culprits.
France, which had 9.6 percent unemployment in November, loses 30,000 jobs a year because of counterfeiters, said Benoit Battistelli, commissioner of the National Institute for Industrial Property, the French patent office. Fake goods, including about 10 percent of French cosmetics, are valued as high as 300 billion euros (US$392 billion), he said.
"Counterfeiting isn't as risky but is more profitable than drug trafficking," Battistelli said in an interview while attending a Hong Kong conference on intellectual property rights.
"Counterfeiting is a major issue between China and France." Under pressure from trading partners such as the US, China set up a task force last year, headed by Vice Premier Wu Yi (吳儀), to step up the crackdown on counterfeiters. China said on Dec. 21 it would make theft of intellectual property punishable by as much as seven years.
China still isn't doing enough to enforce copyright and trademark laws, former US Commerce Secretary Donald Evans said during a visit to China this month before his tenure ended.
Copyright violations cost US companies as much as US$25 billion a year.
Piracy Curbs China is trying to curb piracy, Li Dongsheng, vice minister for State Administration for Industry and Commerce, said in an interview today at the Hong Kong conference. Rather than sue Chinese companies they suspect of piracy, foreign companies can appeal to the local branch of his agency for redress, Li said.
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
CONDITIONAL: The PRC imposes secret requirements that the funding it provides cannot be spent in states with diplomatic relations with Taiwan, Emma Reilly said China has been bribing UN officials to obtain “special benefits” and to block funding from countries that have diplomatic ties with Taiwan, a former UN employee told the British House of Commons on Tuesday. At a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee hearing into “international relations within the multilateral system,” former Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) employee Emma Reilly said in a written statement that “Beijing paid bribes to the two successive Presidents of the [UN] General Assembly” during the two-year negotiation of the Sustainable Development Goals. Another way China exercises influence within the UN Secretariat is
LANDSLIDES POSSIBLE: The agency advised the public to avoid visiting mountainous regions due to more expected aftershocks and rainfall from a series of weather fronts A series of earthquakes over the past few days were likely aftershocks of the April 3 earthquake in Hualien County, with further aftershocks to be expected for up to a year, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Based on the nation’s experience after the quake on Sept. 21, 1999, more aftershocks are possible over the next six months to a year, the agency said. A total of 103 earthquakes of magnitude 4 on the local magnitude scale or higher hit Hualien County from 5:08pm on Monday to 10:27am yesterday, with 27 of them exceeding magnitude 5. They included two, of magnitude
Taiwan’s first drag queen to compete on the internationally acclaimed RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nymphia Wind (妮妃雅), was on Friday crowned the “Next Drag Superstar.” Dressed in a sparkling banana dress, Nymphia Wind swept onto the stage for the final, and stole the show. “Taiwan this is for you,” she said right after show host RuPaul announced her as the winner. “To those who feel like they don’t belong, just remember to live fearlessly and to live their truth,” she said on stage. One of the frontrunners for the past 15 episodes, the 28-year-old breezed through to the final after weeks of showcasing her unique