CAIRO: The Egyptian government needs to immediately establish a committee to combat the specter of copyright infringement and intellectual property theft, urged a seminar held earlier this week on the sidelines of the Cairo International Film Festival. In one of the longest seminars the festival has witnessed in its 30-year history, the anti-piracy and intellectual property protection campaign focused on the global impact of illegal copying of films and other creative works. Mr Helmy Aboul Eish, head of the Egyptian Competitive Committee, discussed the harmful impact of piracy on international competition and domestic economic growth. His speech provided well-documented data already known to most of the audience: the US is losing $2 billion a year from piracy, while illegal copies of CDs and DVDs lead to a loss of hundreds of millions for Egypt as well. Film producer Mohamed El-Adl called for the establishment of a committee responsible for combating piracy and spreading awareness about its destructive effect on the economy through documentaries or Public Service Announcements. Ordinary people need to know that when somebody buys a pirated disk, they re actually committing the crime of theft, he said. Egyptians should learn that they re harming hundreds of families connected to this industry, he added. El-Adl claimed that he personally loses about LE 7 to 8 million a year as a result of piracy. Lawyer Ahmed Abo Ali, one of the partners of Hassouna and Ali law office explained that copyright laws range between LE 5000 to a maximum penalty of LE 10,000 and a month in prison. These laws are never implemented and the government doesn t possess the capabilities to locate the pirates and arrest them consecutively. Medhat El-Adl, Mohamed s El-Adl's scriptwriter brother, accused the government of not valuing film as an important cultural product, adding that this industry is one of the country's indispensable sources of GDP. As for home video piracy, market realities indicate that the average Egyptian citizen cannot afford to pay LE 150 for a DVD. My son was telling me the other day about the pirated games he buys and how it would be ridiculous to spend LE 300 when you can get it for LE 40, Medhat El-Adl told The Daily Star Egypt. El-Adl understands that the retail prices of DVDs or other forms of home entertainment major production companies releases are staggering. These companies don t realize that there s a big difference between the Egyptian market and the Gulf one. He said: Unless these companies offer these DVDs or CDs for lower, affordable price, they ll continue to lose money in Egypt. El-Adl believes it will take years for people to comprehend its real notion, but unless the government works together with artists and pays due respect to films and art, efforts to combat piracy are likely to fail. But some of the participants in the seminar were clearly frustrated by the lack of progress to protect intellectual property. El Sayed Radi, chairman of the Federation of Trade unions, stood up and screamed: We ve been talking about this topic for two years now with no concrete program formed that we can present to the government and we re fed up with conferences that don t say or do anything. Radi described how piracy has developed into a big Mafia that begins with movie theater ushers and ends with policemen who don t regard piracy as a serious felony. The seminar was organized by the International Federation of Film Producers Associations, the FIAPF, and the Center for International Private Enterprise, the CIPE.
