Pretoria - International Property Rights (IPR) experts will meet on Monday for a five-day workshop that will help South Africa to protect IPR effectively.
The workshop follows Japan's proposal to promote trade and investment between Asia and Africa during the Tokyo International Conference on African Development held in 2004.
According to the Department of Science and Technology, South Africa will also receive both financial and technical support on intellectual property from Japan at the workshop.
The workshop will also roll out a three-year training project on IPR which will focus on indigenous knowledge protection, innovation, intellectual property protection and controlling counterfeits.
Depending on the evaluation of the three-year IPR training project, the bilateral cooperation between South Africa and Japan may also see the exercise extended to other countries in Africa.
"This could lead to the establishment of a training institute for regional collaboration, with the overall goal being to improve the creation, protection and use of IPR," the department said.
The aim is to improve the understanding of IPR laws at all levels of government, eventually establishing an IPR policy and legislation office under one roof as well as increasing the number of IPR experts in government and the relevant stakeholders.
"This could also assist with the implementation of the recently enacted IPR for Publicly Financed Research and Development Act of 2008," the department said.
The law clarifies obligations related to the ownership of IPR in the country, which has been a tricky issue for a very long time.
The meeting is co-hosted by the department, the Japan International Cooperation Agency and the World Intellectual Property Organisation.
