14.04.2009
Regional Collective Trademarks — A Purely Domestic Business?
The Japanese Patent Office (JPO) did not accept geographical names as trademarks until 2006, when the Trademark Act was amended to allow for the registration of regional collective trademarks denoting the geographical origin of products. According to figures recently published, 873 regional trademarks have been registered since. The system seems to be widely unknown among foreign applicants, as only four out of 873 trademarks belong to foreign applicants (”Canada Pork”, “Indian Darjeeling”, “Jamaican Blue Mountain Coffee” and “Parma Prosciutto”).
A Japanese regional collective mark of reknown is Kobe beef from the Hyôgo prefecture. Other examples for recently registered regional collective trademarks are Sendai Miso Paste or Yokohama China Town.
Under Japanese law, geographical names can be registered as collective marks for certain goods, if those goods are well known products of a distinct geographical area.
Considering the fact that Japanese consumers attach great importance to the quality and origin of products, there seems to be a lot of unused potential for marketing regional specialty food.
Japan, Japanese Patent Office, Japanisches Patentamt, JPO, Marken, trademarks
