The IP culture concept of respecting knowledge, advocating innovation, integrity, law-abiding, and fair competition has penetrated deep into the hearts of the public and provided strong support for building China into an IP powerhouse. On March 30, the China National Intellectual Property Administration (CNIPA) held a regular press conference, introducing IP culture development and the future work plan for the first time. Heng Fuguang, Spokesperson and Deputy Director General of the General Affairs Office of the CNIPA, spoke at the meeting.

The reporter learned at the press conference that, over the years, the CNIPA has made continuous efforts to promote IP culture development and played an active part in fostering a publicity paradigm featuring the involvement of multiple parties and coordination with other fields. The awareness of respecting and protecting intellectual property rights (IPRs) has been significantly improved in the whole society, and innovative entities have leveraged IPRs to shore up their competitiveness.

Four features of the 2022 National IP Publicity Week

The 2022 National IP Publicity Week will kick off in less than a month. Heng Fuguang mentioned that this year's publicity week activities will be held online and on site from April 20 to 26. The 2022 National IP Publicity Week activities, with the theme of "Embarking on a New Journey to Build China into an IP Powerhouse", highlight four features of paying more attention to the theme and main tasks, focusing on IP work at the community level, strengthening communication and interaction, and telling stories well.

The 2022 National IP Publicity Week activities will give greater priority to the main task of welcoming the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC). Activities will be held to create an atmosphere conducive to the successful convening of the 20th National Congress of the CPC, including exhibitions in celebration of China's recent IP achievements, dissemination of the Outlines for Building an Intellectual Property Power (2021-2035) and the implementation of the 14th Five-Year Plan (2021-2025), training and press releases, etc.

There will be four parallel sessions in Hubei, Inner Mongolia, Jiangsu and Guangzhou, which will be linked with the main venue in Beijing through live streaming on new media platforms. During the publicity week, the CNIPA will launch its official accounts on Toutiao, Kuaishou, and other new media platforms and build an online exhibition hall. The theme of World Intellectual Property Day 2022 is "IP and Youth: Innovating for a Better Future". Taking this into consideration, the CNIPA will invite young representatives from all walks of life to share their IP work experience, so as to encourage their active participation in the building of an IP power. In addition, the CNIPA will interact with overseas IP institutions, relevant media platforms and practitioners to publicize the achievements of China's IP development.

It is understood that the National IP Publicity Week has been held for 13 consecutive years since 2009 and has become an important brand activity for the development of China's IP culture.

Heng said that the CPC Central Committee and the State Council attach great importance to IP culture development. The CNIPA has made concrete efforts to hold brand culture activities, regular press conferences and thematic interviews, promote the development of IP-related official accounts on new media platforms, release Chinese and English documentaries as well as publish themed books. Moreover, it has worked to establish an expert advisory committee to enhance IP education in primary and secondary schools and hold international seminars to share China's successful experience in targeted poverty alleviation through the application of IPRs. As a result, the environment for IP culture development has been improved; the brand influence of IP culture has continued to increase; and the communication channels of IP culture have been expanded. In addition, IP cultural products have become increasingly rich; the cultivation of IP talents has been fully strengthened, and the IP cultural development experience has been shared worldwide.

As IP culture development yields fruitful outcomes, its concept is changing with economic and social development. Last year, the Central Committee of the CPC and the State Council issued the Outlines for Building an Intellectual Property Power (2021-2035), in which fair competition is included in the IP cultural concept of respecting knowledge and advocating innovation, integrity, and law-abiding. Heng explained that the inclusion of fair competition aims to give full play to the basic guarantee role of the IP system in stimulating innovation, stabilize market expectations, and expand opening to the outside world through strict protection of IPRs and the implementation of a punitive compensation system. In the meantime, this effort is to ensure fair and reasonable IP protection, effectively regulate the abuse of IPRs for illegitimate benefits, and maintain a fair and competitive market environment, thereby stimulating innovation while protecting public interests and providing solid IP culture support for China's high-quality economic development.

A total of 690,000 IP professionals in China

IP specialists is the most fundamental, core and critical element in developing the IP industry and helping China become a global center for IPRs. The 14th Five-Year Plan for Intellectual Property Talents issued last year set a goal of having more than one million IP professionals nationwide by 2025. Feng Zhaolong, First-Class Inspector of the Personnel Department of the CNIPA, introduced at the press conference that up to now, the number of IP professionals in China has reached 690,000.

In terms of personnel training, it's learned that more than 50 universities across China have established IP colleges and hundreds of universities have set up IP majors, along with 26 national IP training bases nationwide. For the evaluation of IP professionals, Feng stated that IP will be officially included in the professional subjects of China's national economic professional and technical qualification examination. It is estimated that by the end of the 14th Five-Year Plan, the number of IP professionals at or above the intermediate level (including intermediate) will reach 20,000. Going forward, the CNIPA will keep a close eye on the progress of the professional title system reform for economic professionals and take supporting measures in light of the actual situation of its IP work, said Feng.

Objectively, the Covid-19 pandemic has promoted the development of distance education. In the IP distance education field, Sun Wei, Head of the China Intellectual Property Training Center, said that the Center has developed 24 online platforms and more than 220 stations across the country, offering more than 570 online courses and that they have received over nine million visits. Sun added that since the outbreak of Covid-19, they have stepped up efforts to provide more courses. The organization of more than 1,200 recorded training and over 150 live streaming training has effectively alleviated the contradiction between supply and demand of IP training.

The youth of today are the future of the nation and reserve forces of China's IP professionals. According to statistics, up to now, a total of 165 primary and secondary schools have been identified as national-level IP pilot schools. Nearly two million students in around 1,400 primary and secondary schools across the country have received IP education. The related work has also been highly appreciated by the international community, which considers that China's IP education has developed rapidly and achieved fruitful results despite a late start. Sun further expressed that in the future, efforts will be made to explore new models, paths, and methods of IP education for young people. For example, the Center will actively develop an "internet+training" work pattern, and cooperate with new media platforms such as Bilibili to popularize IP knowledge among young people. Moves will also be made to advance research on the goals, standards, and content system of IP education in primary and secondary schools and work in collaboration with WIPO Academy and other institutions to organize a variety of activities.