Thailand vows to continue driving forward with innovations, technologies and intellectual property (IP), hoping such areas will help boost international trade in the near future.
Speaking via video at the launch of the Global Innovation Index (GII) 2021 organised on Tuesday by the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) in Geneva, Commerce Minister Jurin Laksanawisit said Thailand has pinned hopes on IP as one of the key tools to develop and revitalise the economy by encouraging the creation, commercialisation, protection and enforcement of creators, inventors, and rights of small and medium enterprises.
Another key mission of the Commerce Ministry is to promote Geographical Indications (GI) to enhance the life quality and well-being of local people.
GI is a distinctive certificate used to identify a product as originating from a particular country, region or locality that has specific qualities, reputation or other unique characteristics.
The certification of unique characteristics and quality is expected to increase market value in developed countries.
"The Commerce Ministry has implemented myriad intellectual property promotion policies including the achievement to expedite GI registration process to cover all 77 provinces, e-filing service development for IP registration, e-certificates for patents and petty patents, fast-track process for trademark registration that reduces time from 12 months to only six months," said Mr Jurin.
The ministry has shortened the time for trademark renewal from 60 days to 60 minutes and the time for copyright notification from 30 days to only three days while trying to settle IP disputes online.
According to the latest Global Innovation Index 2021 rankings, Thailand's innovation capability has climbed one spot and is now ranked 43rd out of 132 countries globally from 44th last year.
The Global Innovation Index is a key indicator that reflects the global knowledge, technology and creativity output including R&D, which leads to an effective evaluation of innovation performance and policymaking decisions of all countries.