Pirated goods seized in Jan.-Jun total P2.3 billion

Government seized P2.3 billion worth of pirated items in ports where the Intellectual Property Office of the Philippines (IP Philippines) was intensifying its anti-piracy campaign in the first half of the year. “About 70 percent of the pirated items in the country are imported, so the Bureau of Customs (BOC) is our first line of defense," Ricardo R. Blancaflor, IP Philippines director general, told reporters. Blancaflor said the BOC topped other agencies in terms of seizures, including over P880 million worth of assorted pirated goods contained in three container vans whose contents were declared as personal effects. Authorities discovered, when the boxes from the container vans were opened, that the personal items were actually belts, shoes, garments, fake watches, and cellular phones from China. Government invoked provisions of the Tariffs and Customs Code – to forfeit and destroy – the pirated goods that were misdeclared, considering that the IP Code would entail what could be protracted court proceedings before authorities could take over the seized goods, Blancaflor said. Many anti-piracy operations were on hold during the election period. “Only the OMB (Optical Media Board) and the BOC conducted operations during the election period," he said. This year, authorities expected to match, if not overtake, the P5.6 billion worth of seized goods last year, Blancaflor said. —VS, GMANews.TV