COUNTERFEITING AND PIRACY CONTRIBUTE NEGATIVELY TOWARDS NATIONAL DEVELOPMENT-CHIEF JUSTICE OF GHANA

The Chief Justice of Ghana Her Ladyship Georgina Theodora Wood has disclosed that counterfeiting and piracy contribute negatively towards national development. "It is important for everyone to have a stake in the protection of intellectual property rights" . She disclosed this in a regional workshop on the theme “IP Protection: The Border and beyond”. Justice Wood said counterfeiting which includes national currencies cause total debt to its respective county. “All of us assembled here have rare and unique opportunity to lead in protecting these rights and so contributing to the development of a strong IP regime for the sub region”. She reiterated that, the workshop which is in collaboration with the United States government and ECOWAS will seek to further develop the quality of intellectual property protection in the west African sub-region by facilitating co-operation between enforcement agencies in the region, improve the skills and knowledge of IP enforcement officials to interdict, investigate and adjudicate counterfeit and pirated goods and also initiate our commitment to produce a regional policy for a more effective implementation and enforcement of IP rights in west Africa His Excellency Donald Teitelbaum of the U.S embassy in Ghana and DR. Mohammed Ibn Chambas of ECOWAS were all present at the gathering .The Funding of the workshop which will end today was provided by the USAID.