A Study on the Legal Scheme of Trademark Dispute Settlement in Taiwan and China：in the view of TRIPS Agreement

• Main Authors: Yung-chieh Wang, 王詠潔
• Other Authors: none
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2012
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/54979190640010813226

碩士 === 東吳大學 === 法律學系 === 100 === The Agreement on Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property (TRIPS), which was concluded in 1994 during the eighth round of the multilateral trade negotiation(the Uruguay Round), marks a milestone in the protection of intellectual rights. The trademark protection regulatory system forms an important part of TRIPS. On December 11, 2001 and January 1, 2002, China and Taiwan were respectively admitted to the World Trade Organization(WTO) and became subject to TRIPS regulations. In the past decade, both parties have repeatedly amended their domestic trademark protection regulations to ensure full statutory compliance with international standards. Trademark protection under TRIPS, nevertheless, is essentially formed from the perspectives of developed countries, whether it be the standards or duration of the protection. Being developing countries, China and Taiwan have to use the more flexible rules of the TRIPS Agreement to create compatible trademark protection systems on their own. In analyzing the existing statutory systems for trademark protection in China and Taiwan, they not only both deviate from the TRIPS Agreement, but are also different from each other. Currently, the focus of economic and trade activities have been shifted from the conventional manufacturing industry to high-tech business. This trend has led to closer cross-strait economic and trade relations. Trademark protection, therefore, has become a critical issue in the process of cross-strait exchanges. With increased product and service marketing activities, progressively more disputes on trademark or brand protection are arising. This is mostly due to the differences in the cross-strait political, economic and cultural environments and the deviation in trademark protection regulations. With the lack of an effective statutory system for dispute settlement, trademark rights, though lawfully granted, would be nothing but a piece of paper. Considering that the TRIPS Agreement is binding to WTO members, all disputes among the members should naturally be subject to the WTO dispute settlement system. Therefore, any trademark-related disputes between China and Taiwan should in principle be settled based on the WTO dispute settlement regulations. The signing of the Cross-Straits Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement(ECFA) and the Cross-Strait Intellectual Property Rights Protection Cooperation Agreement in June, 2010 has further established a historical benchmark for the cross-strait cooperation in trademark rights protection. There is, however, not yet a well-established dispute settlement system under the ECFA and the Cross-Strait Intellectual Property Right Protection Cooperation Agreement. The dispute settlement system therefore should also be WTO-compliant. To deal with the increasing cross-strait trademark disputes after the signing of the ECFA, it is absolutely necessary that we conduct an in-depth analysis on the existing WTO dispute settlement system. In this paper, the author has examined the trademark dispute settlement system in Mainland China, based on the regulatory framework of the TRIPS Agreement. While actively promoting normal economic and trade relations between China and Taiwan, it is sought that, through the comparative analysis and the construction of relevant statutory systems, we can effectively prevent and resolve the cross-strait trademark disputes and reduce the costs of business development.