Strategy of the intellectual property development for the period of ...

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ights, with the aim to emphasize the protection of legality, the decision making processin the second degree was introduced in the administrative procedure. However, the twodegree decision making process is selectively introduced: the appeal is allowed for thedecisions of the Office in all the procedures except the procedure for grant, terminationand maintenance of patent or petty patent. Also, the appeal is not allowed against thedecisions of the Ministry of Agriculture which decides in the procedure regarding theright of the plant varieties breeders. Finally, the Government is the instance of the seconddegree, which has no special expert body that would be competent to decide in the seconddegree. Such circumstances give grounds for the discussion about the equality of theholders of the different kinds of intellectual property rights, as well as the competenceand the independence of the second degree instance.The problem of the expert competence in the subject matter of the intellectual propertyrights essentially limits the space for actual protection of legality in this subject matterand in the administrative suit. As it is not realistic to secure some other kind of aspecialized panel of the Administrative Court in the foreseeable future, other ways mustbe considered to increase the capacity of court in the administrative suits to passdecisions based on the merit on the thing, and not only with regard to the proceduralissues.Finally, let us take a step back to consider the total institutional capacity of the Office, theissue of its future financing should be resolved. That question is present for almost onedecade, in particular, since the global trend has been recognized to shift the focus of thefunctions of national administration for intellectual property from purely administrativeone to service oriented, based on information-coordination-mediation. Those nonadministrative functions, which become dominant, request more flexibility of theinstitution with regard to the possibility to answer the requests facing it. Bearing in mindthat such flexibility (with regard to experts, working programs, etc.) can not be achievedin the conditions of purely budget financing, there are more states in Europe, where theintellectual property administrations are self-financed or use the combination of budgetfunds and own income (Romania, Slovenia, Hungary, Switzerland, France, Great Britain,Denmark, Finland, Moldavia, etc ).The financing of all the development functions of the Office in the last 10 years camefrom the development funds of the European Union, from the income that the Officerealized on the basis of the Cooperation and Extension Agreement with the EuropeanPatent Organization (from the designation fees of the Republic of Serbia in the Europeanpatent applications) and from the technical assistance of the World Intellectual PropertyOrganization. In October 2010, the Republic of Serbia became the member of theEuropean Patent Organization, which significantly increased the obligations of the Office(the participation in the work of the Administrative Council as the executive body of theEPO, participation in the working bodies of the EPO, obligations from theimplementation of the Action Plan intended for the states members, etc.), and all theincome has been abolished on the basis of fees for the designation of the European patentapplications, because the mentioned Cooperation and Extension Agreement is no longerimplemented. Also, on the basis of the three year long IPA National Project of the16
European Union, in January 2010, the Education and Information Centre has been openedaiming at giving support to the research and development institutions and the economy ofthe Republic of Serbia in the development of competitiveness, raising awareness on thesocial importance of intellectual property, raising the level of knowledge in the bodies forthe enforcement of IP rights, etc. After the finalization of the IPA Project, in December2011, the financing of the Education and Information Centre will be completelytransferred to the Office, which puts in danger the survival of the Centre and all theactivities it has started in the conditions of budget restrictions.Thanks to the EU CARDS Project in 2004, the Office significantly improved itsinformatics infrastructure. However, the transfer to electronic filing and electroniccommunication with the users, demands further investments, as well as equipment andsoftware and also educated personnel. Also, the use of new information technologiesavailable to the Office thanks to the foreign technical aid will be made more difficultwhen the income form the foreign funds is cut down previously originating from theEuropean patent applications, and the Office takes over obligation to pay for theexpensive software packages and reinvest in the new informatics hardware.The tasks of patent applications examination and the examination of other industrialproperty rights demand highly educated experts with the knowledge of several worldlanguages, more education in informatics and specific knowledge in the field ofchemistry, physics, machine engineering, electronics, law, etc. Restrictive policy ofbudget financing neither allows the Office to employ the experts of the mentioned profile,nor enables that they might be engaged in sufficient number. Therefore, some of the keyhighly expert tasks, that must be performed in continuity and with high quality areexecuted by just one employee. Also, the number of the employees that can have thehighest ranks in the system of government administration is limited beforehand withouttaking into consideration the needs of the service, which limits stimulation for theemployees, and even the most qualified experts tend to leave the Office, and the renewalof such a profile of employees is difficult.The specific feature of the Office is that the high quality profile of experts can beeducated to work in the Office only after long years of special training which partly takesplace in the foreign offices and international institutions. The nature of the tasks is suchthat the Office has no elasticity in the recruitment, and thus no possibility to replace, atthe work force market, the appropriate experts quickly which means that it must conductthe human resources policy with the utmost care and plan at least on the medium termlevel, in order to achieve stability and build solidly on the long term organizational andfinancial preconditions.In the existing economic situation, marked by the pressure upon the Government toreduce the expenditure for public administration, it is not realistic to expect from theOffice to come into the position to obtain resources from the budget funds that would besufficient for the financing of its current and development functions. Therefore, thetransfer to self financing is a rational way to reduce the pressure on the public budget,and yet to enable the Office to perform its competences with high quality and to develop.17
Page 1 and 2: On the basis of article 45, paragra
Page 3 and 4: evision of model of the economic gr
Page 5 and 6: all of these methods is to engage a
Page 7 and 8: searches for the favourable conditi
Page 9 and 10: - Public-private partnership betwee
Page 11 and 12: special remuneration paid in the pr
Page 13 and 14: including the efficient means for t
Page 15: Having all this in mind, it is evid
Page 19 and 20: The European Commission gave opinio
Page 21 and 22: electronic administration of the ap
Page 23 and 24: Terms which have been international
Page 25 and 26: coordination and cooperation, but a
Page 27 and 28: intellectual property protection an
Page 29 and 30: than 5% of court cases in Serbia, a
Page 31 and 32: Gazette RS” No 46/2006 and 104/20
Page 33 and 34: property, no legal discrimination i
Page 35 and 36: asset. The ceding to others of the
Page 37 and 38: VI.The Office will continually cond
Page 39 and 40: and training of human resources are
Page 41 and 42: IX.Introduce the checking of the le

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