USTR welcomes Thailand’s efforts to improve the intellectual property protection and enforcement. However, there still are some legislative objectifs that Thailand has to achieve: legislation to address landlord liability and unauthorized camcording of motion pictures in theaters; to provide Thai Customs with ex officio authority; to fully implement the provisions of the WIPO Internet Treaties; to restructure the Trade Secret Committee and modify penalty provisions under the Trade Secrets Act; to accelerate patent examination and registration procedures and address issues such as partial designs; and to establish improved legal mechanisms to address the rapidly growing problem of copyright piracy and trademark counterfeiting on the Internet; taking enforcement action against widespread piracy and counterfeiting in the country; imposing deterrent-level sentences; addressing effectively its longstanding problem of piracy of cable and satellite signals. Thailand should also work to provide an “effective system for protecting against the unfair commercial use, as well as unauthorized disclosure, of test or other data generated to obtain marketing approval for pharmaceutical and agricultural chemical products”. The report also touches Thailand’s public health challenges and the need of support for innovation.
The entire report can be found here.
