Russian expert: USA announces inadequate losses from Russian pirates

Russia's Ministry of Economic Development and Trade believes that the losses amount, estimated by the International Intellectual Property Alliance, is inadequate. The alliance estimates the losses entailed by Russian counterfeit manufacturers' activities at $1 billion, Elena Danilova, director of the Foreign Economic Relations Department under the Ministry of Economic Development and Trade, told reporters on Wednesday.

According to Mrs. Danilova, the amount is inadequate, because the alliance's experts proceeded from the loss of profits without taking into account the Russian market's elastic demand.

Mrs. Danilova said that within the framework of the General Preferential System, effective in the USA, Russia was provided with lots of goods, and, at the same time, it established conditions for the Russian manufacturers' presence on the US market.

On June 30, the US trade mission's administration is to discuss the issue of expelling Russia from the General Preferential System.

According to Mrs. Danilova, experts expect the Russian manufacturers' losses entailed by the expulsion to amount to almost $500 million. The General Preferential System covering 4,500 items from 140 countries provides for duty-free import of goods, worth over $400 million, to the USA annually.

The issue of expelling Russia from the system was brought up by the International Intellectual Property Alliance incorporating US rights holders associations.

According to Mrs. Danilova, the USA is concerned with the situation in Russia in terms of intellectual property protection. She pointed out that, even so, the USA had earlier been keeping Russia in the same category within the preferential system's framework. "The American side did not regard the situation with copyright violations as critical", said Mrs. Danilova. At the same time, she noted that the foreign partners did not always possess full information in this sphere. The Russian side regularly provides its counterparts abroad with the information on the intellectual property protection measures taken by Russia.