Key US delegate meets with regional decision-makers ahead of 1st Arab Consumer and Brand Protection Forum
US Patent and Trademark Office General Manager Jennifer Groves shares America’s experience in combating commercial fraud and piracy
Mrs. Jennifer Groves, the General Manager of United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) and representative of the Trade Executive Office of the President of the United States, presented a lecture at the second session of preparatory meetings for the first Arab Consumer and Brand Protection Forum, in which she shared her country’s experience in combating commercial fraud and counterfeiting. The meeting was held recently at the Arab League headquarters in Cairo.
The participation of the USPTO in the preparatory meetings aims at enabling the regional standardization bodies to learn from global best practices and adopt successful techniques and methods which have contributed significantly to reducing the percentage of commercial fraud and piracy in the USA.
Mrs. Groves spoke at length on the measures taken by the United States to protect intellectual property rights and to prevent piracy and counterfeiting, pointing out the importance of concerted international efforts to intensify penalties and procedures to prevent this phenomenon, which affect all countries in the world.
All ideas and suggestions discussed at these meetings will be drafted for presentation to the First Arab Consumer and Brand Protection Forum ( www.arabworldprotect.com) which will take place at Jeddah, Saudi Arabia from 19-21 October, 2008 under the auspices of His Royal Highness Prince Khalid Al-Faisal, the Governor of Makkah region.
Meanwhile, Engineer Saudi Al-Askar, the acting Secretary-General of Gulf Standardization Organization (GSO), outlined the GSO’s vision, saying, “establishing the necessary infrastructure is the basic pillar for the protection of trademark and for building up customer confidence in products and exports coming from the Gulf.”
Al-Askar added that GSO has established a unified standardization system for the GCC, and has started to set up centers to provide accreditation services that will help enhance the credibility of Gulf systems.
