On Monday the parliament's lower chamber held a roundtable devoted to legal grounds for fight against counterfeiting.
The adopted recommendations read that the volume of counterfeited, fake and pirated products on the market continues growing.
Analyses of over 50,000 inspections conducted in 2004 show that pirated products account for almost one third of all goods.
In particular, counterfeits account for one fifth of food products, alcohol and tobacco and for 57% of products of the light industry. One fifth of household chemistry, toys, perfumery and cosmetics is also faked.
Out of 2.4 mln of audiovisual products, inspections confiscated 1 mln. After checks on 3,800 enterprises producing and selling drugs, 127 criminal cases were launched.
The roundtable participants noted that despite the increasing number of proceedings launched on charges of production and sales of counterfeited products, few of them reach the court. The punishment envisaged by the appropriate articles in the Russian criminal code is rarely enforced in practice.
In this connection, the parliamentarians called for toughening the requirements of the Customs, Criminal, Civil and Administrative Codes with regard to counterfeiters. They also consider it necessary to introduce appropriate amendments to the laws on registering company names, trademarks, on licensing, on copyright and allied rights.
