ldc_dinh-huu-phi
11 December 2018

Vietnam IP office interview: Trade deals and treaties

It is fair to say that Vietnam punches above its weight on the international stage. With its economy having only the 46th biggest GDP in 2017 according to the International Monetary Fund, Vietnam recently completed a free trade deal with the EU and is the union’s second most important trading partner in the ASEAN region behind Singapore.

The EU-Vietnam free trade agreement, which was completed in July but has yet to be ratified, will require Vietnam to make a number of changes to its IP regime, including beefing up enforcement measures and allowing for protection of well-known trademarks. The country will also commit to joining several IP treaties, including the Hague Agreement and the World Intellectual Property Organization’s (WIPO) Internet Treaties.

On top of this, Vietnam is one of 11 parties to the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP). President Donald Trump may have pulled the US out of the deal’s previous incarnation (the TPP), but Vietnam and the remaining ten parties continued negotiating, and Vietnam signed the new version in March.

While the ASEAN nation has yet to ratify the agreement, as part of the project it has signed up to a wide-ranging chapter on IP which builds on the framework created by existing international treaties.

A country which became a WIPO member in 1976—just a year after being reunified following a brutal war—Vietnam has always been clearly committed to IP. Since then, it has signed a host of major IP treaties and, in 2006, enacted its first standalone IP law.

In view of the treaty developments in particular, it has been a busy few years for the National Office of Intellectual Property of Vietnam (NOIP) and its director general Dinh Huu Phi, who speaks to WIPR about the country’s IP landscape.

Giving an overview of filing activity, Dinh confirms that between 2006 (when the IP law was introduced) and 2016, the number of IP applications that NOIP received increased by around 10 to 12% year on year, with 2016’s total being 104,275. In WIPO’s ranking of total (resident and abroad) IP filing activity by origin in 2016, Vietnam came just two places behind Singapore—and actually finished higher in the categories of trademarks and designs.

Challenges

Although the legal regime is looking increasingly solid, and the number of IP applications is on the rise, there are challenges that need addressing.

Enforcement is perhaps the most prominent of these, as the Office of the US Trade Representative’s “2018 Special 301 Report” reveals. While the report itself is arguably vulnerable to some political bias, it is open to submissions and is often cited by IP stakeholders. The latest edition says that online piracy and counterfeiting are common in Vietnam, while fake goods remain “widely available” in physical markets.

Speaking to WIPR, Dinh does not shy away from the enforcement issue, saying it is a challenge for the office, but he explains that the difficulty lies in there being several authorities with responsibility for IP enforcement. These responsibilities are duplicated, he says, and there is a lack of coordination between the authorities.

For example, while the NOIP is the chief IP body, the Copyright Office of Vietnam and the Plant Variety Protection Office also administer the country’s IP system, and they all fall under different government ministries.

“The information has not been promptly exchanged among ministries, sectors and localities (especially between ministries and sectors), which leads to insufficient coordination among relevant agencies,” Dinh says.

Meanwhile, he adds, the court system does not have sufficient staff who have been properly trained and qualified to deal with complicated IP cases in a timely and effective manner.

“In addition, the awareness of consumers, organisations and enterprises on the protection and enforcement of IP is not high. They are not fully aware of their rights as well as the need to respect the rights of others,” he says, noting that IP rights owners and attorneys still hesitate in bringing cases to court and instead prefer to use administrative measures for dealing with infringements.

A further challenge is that the handling of IP applications is not transparent enough, he says.

Training

The NOIP and other bodies are trying to battle these problems. Dinh says there are longstanding efforts to boost access to IP information, including applications and their relevant descriptions.

He adds that every year there are training courses on enhancing IP awareness among IP agencies, professional associations and other groups, as well as the wider public, with an average of nearly 50 courses per year in the last three years. Seminars, workshops and conferences are also regular occurrences.

On the IP enforcement front, the NOIP has been involved in the establishment and operation of a searchable database of IP information. The office is leading the charge in conjunction with four other agencies: the Inspectorate of the Ministry of Science and Technology; the Economic Police Department; the Market Surveillance Agency; and the Anti-Smuggling Investigation Department. The network seeks to supply information to the Vietnam Intellectual Property Research Institute for IP assessment activities, says Dinh.

In a similar vein to this internal collaboration, the NOIP may need to look to its ASEAN neighbours for further assistance in boosting the IP regime. Dinh says that over the last 20 years, ASEAN cooperation on IP has been continuously developed. Through the activities of the ASEAN Working Group on Intellectual Property Cooperation, IP offices have established a close cooperation and understanding, he explains.

“ASEAN member states have shared their experiences and helped each other in the development of legal systems, management and enforcement of IP rights. Many projects and programmes have been proposed and implemented, and have brought about significant effects on the development of the IP system of ASEAN member states,” he adds.

Dinh highlights the ASEAN IPR Action Plan (2016-2025), under which the ASEAN member states have agreed to implement four main objectives, including strengthening the capacity of the IP offices and infrastructure in the region, and developing a comprehensive and enlarged ASEAN IP ecosystem.

Add to this Vietnam’s involvement in further trade deals, not least the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership—between the ASEAN bloc and China, India, Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand—and Dinh can expect some long days in the office in the next few years.

Vietnam fact file

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