The Dominican Republic-Central America Free Trade Agreement (DR-CAFTA) will open new opportunities for U.S. industries for which intellectual property rights (IPR) protections are key to their international competitiveness. Strong and comprehensive copyright protection and enforcement are important ingredients for robust economic growth and development.

DR-CAFTA provides for strong IPR protections.

• DR-CAFTA obligates parties to accede to a number of key treaties, and its national treatment obligations apply to all products. The provisions relating to patents and trademarks clarify or enhance those of the World Trade Organization’s (WTO) Trade-Related Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) agreement.
• DR-CAFTA addresses copyright issues specific to the Internet age, including the transmission of material over the Internet. It strengthens trademark and data protection. All laws, regulations, procedures and final judicial decisions concerning the protection or enforcement of IPR must be in writing and published or made publicly available.
• To keep pace with the latest technological progress, DR-CAFTA is considered more extensive than the TRIPS agreement because it provides longer terms of protection, stronger enforcement measures, and specific coverage of electronic and digital media.
• DR-CAFTA contains comprehensive obligations for enforcement and civil and criminal liability for:
  • knowing circumvention of measure to protect works,
  • trafficking in devices intended to circumvent protections, and
  • removing or altering rights-management information.
• In addition, actions must be taken in both the criminal and customs areas. The process for addressing copyright infringement is speeded up. Enforcement measures are strengthened to cope with online infringement.

Stronger IPR provisions will benefit U.S. businesses.

• Because of the small size of the regional economy, the U.S. International Trade Commission concluded that the DR-CAFTA’s IPR provisions likely will have a small but positive impact on the revenues of U.S. industries dependent on copyrights, trademarks, patents and trade secrets.
  • The International Intellectual Property Alliance estimates that U.S. losses in the DR-CAFTA region to copyright piracy totaled $63 million in 2003 — losses that should disappear after DR-CAFTA is fully implemented and enforced.
  • U.S. pharmaceutical companies believe that DR-CAFTA’s IPR provisions, coupled with tariff reductions, will lead to an increase in U.S. pharmaceutical exports. U.S. exports face varying tariff rates in the region of up to 15 percent.

DR-CAFTA meets Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) negotiating objectives for IPR protection.

• Congress stipulated a number of provisions for trade agreements specific to the protection of IPR, which have been addressed by DR-CAFTA. Broadly, trade agreements should further promote adequate and effective IPR and secure fair, equitable and nondiscriminatory market access opportunities for U.S. entities that rely on IPR protection.
• Trade agreements should provide strong protection for new and emerging technologies and new methods of transmitting and distributing products embodying IPR, ensure that rightholders have the legal and technological means to control the use of their works and to prevent the unauthorized use of their works, and provide strong enforcement of IPR.
• DR-CAFTA accomplishes all these objectives in ways that establish clear precedents in most key areas of intellectual property protection for future trade agreements. Its commitments set a new baseline for all future free trade agreements.

IPR businesses endorse DR-CAFTA.

• Congressional approval of the agreement will promote economic growth in the DR-CAFTA countries, with appropriate links to new growth in American industries for which copyright protection is paramount. It raises commitments from the DR-CAFTA partners to a new level for these industries. Thus, it is an important building block in the overall trade strategy to open markets for U.S. businesses and workers through a network of free trade agreements in the WTO — a strategy that promotes economic growth in the United States.

DR-CAFTA recognizes that comprehensive copyright protection and high enforcement standards support economic growth, job creation and the future of global commerce when these standards are adopted by a trade region.