Jamaica remains on American watch list 301, a listing of countries viewed as intellectual property thieves, despite long-standing promises by the Government to crack down on abusers, notably in the cable industry.

The list, which comes out of the Office of the United States Trade Representative this year, cited Jamaica as one of several countries which continue to pirate intellectual properties, and it called for Parliament to reform patent laws to protect intellectual property.

“We urge the Government of Jamaica to reform its patent law as soon as possible to comply fully with international standards for patent protection,” the report stated.

Noting that in January 2004 the Jamaican Parliament had approved a Bill to protect brand Jamaica internationally, the report contended that little had been done to protect international brands locally.

While lauding the country for having “reasonably good copyright and trademark protection regimes”, it called Jamaica’s patent regime “outdated” and “falling short of international standards”.

“Jamaica was included on the Special 301 watch list as a result of lack of parliamentary action to bring patent, industrial design and plant variety laws into conformity with international standards,” the statement read.

One of the major grievances of the Americans was the continued use by local cable television companies of networks and material plucked from US domestic satellites without licence, and which they sold to customers.

The Broadcasting Commission, which regulates the industry, admitted that some operators had no licence to offer several of the networks currently available to cable viewers. Efforts at securing licences have been on the table for several years.

In 2002, the then Information Minister Colin Campbell said cable subscribers had complied with the commission’s demand for evidence of compliance with regulations. However, talks were still underway to secure those licences.

“We are aware that Jamaica has been on this list and has been for some while,” Jacqueline Jackson, information officer at the commission said Friday.

According to Jackson, the cable issue was one of at least five which fall under copyright and patent, and Jamaica was viewed as delaying the implementation of legislation to protect intellectual property.

Foot-dragging on legislation had irked local free-to-air television systems, which complained about the piracy, saying they were at a competitive disadvantage against cable systems which do not pay for their programmes.

President of the CVM group of companies, Dr David McBean, reiterated in an interview with the Sunday Observer that the playing field was not level.

“It is not a secret that Jamaica is on this list. It is not the first time either,” he said Friday.

The issue of piracy raised its head during the just concluded Olympic Games in Athens and resulted in the blackout of networks carrying the games, upsetting local cable subscribers.

The blackout caused a furore, with subscribers venting their anger on their cable providers and insisting that they paid for the channels and should get them.

McBean responded: “When we go out and acquire rights to show programmes, we need to recover from our advertisers. We don’t run a charity.”

He added that it was not beyond the cable companies to acquire rights, citing Sportsmax, as at least one company which had acquired sports broadcast rights.

He urged the Government to deal speedily with the legislation so that the local free-to-air stations were not placed at a disadvantage, as obtained currently.

While the issue of intellectual property piracy was not confined to the cable industry, McBean said that Jamaica will remain on the list if operators did not take steps to get permission to show the progammes they do.

Jamaica and the United States signed an Intellectual Property Rights Agreement (1994) and a Bilateral Investment Treaty, which came into force March 1997.

In June 1999, Jamaica’s Senate passed three related pieces of legislation: the new Trademarks Act, the Layout-Designs (Topographies) Act and a Bill to amend the Copyright Act to extend its coverage to include databases as well as the issue of trading in encrypted transmissions.

All three have been enacted in fulfilment of Jamaica’s obligations under the World Trade Organisation agreement on the trade-related aspects of intellectual property rights (TRIPS), the Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property (to which Jamaica is seeking to become a signatory), and under the bilateral agreement on intellectual property between Jamaica and the United States.