Singapore ranked No. 5 for IP protection
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Singapore has won praise for creating a robust environment where intellectual property (IP) rights are protected and enforced.
The republic has been ranked No. 5 among 30 economies assessed by the Global Intellectual Property Centre (GIPC), part of the US Chamber of Commerce that manages IP-related issues.
It scored 25.38 points out of a possible 30 in the International IP Index, behind the US - which topped the list at 28.53 points - Britain, Germany and France.
This is higher than its score of 25.12 points in the previous edition of the index, even though it had been ranked fourth among the 25 economies then.
Thailand logged the lowest score at just 7.1 points, followed by India and Vietnam.
The economies, which did not include Hong Kong, were evaluated based on 30 criteria, including the protection and enforcement of patents, copyrights, trademarks, trade secrets and participation in relevant global treaties.
Singapore's better performance was due to policy amendments introduced last July, which successfully strengthened its copyright regime, particularly against online piracy, said the report.
"It sends a strong message that Singapore is doing something right," GIPC executive vice-president Mark Elliot told The Straits Times yesterday.
"The country has established a very solid rule of law around IP protection, and it's quite clear that much economic investment has occurred here as a result of the government having established this framework over many years."
But some areas of weaknesses remain, such as the country's regulatory data protection term, which Elliot felt should be extended from five to 12 years, in line with that in the US and the European Union.
This would help biopharmaceutical firms particularly, and enable Singapore to develop further as a regional biomedical hub.
"IP drives innovation and leads to strong economies with good-paying jobs, something every country hopes to achieve," added Elliot.
"Countries that do particularly well in attracting investment are those that spend time looking at where innovations are going, anticipating and then putting in place the IP protection measures needed to drive those innovations."
