We have been busy the last couple of months, especially on AI, forming new alliances with UNESCO, OECD and the UN, growing existing partnerships with WIPO, ARIPO, APNET, ASEAN, CERLALC and UEMOA, hosting several webinars and meetings, and preparing for the Mid-Year Meetings in Valencia and the IWC and GA in Quebec.
At the recent 45th Session of WIPO's SCCR, together with Tracey Armstrong, IFRRO President, and Samantha Holman, First Vice-President, IFRRO presented four statements on key topics such as Exceptions and Limitations, AI, Resale Right and PLR. More information is available here.
Our Asia-Pacific Committee met in Hong Kong from 25-26th April, kindly hosted by our member HKRRLS. Aside from our members in the region, we were honored to be joined by representatives of the Hong Kong SAR Government, Create HK and WIPO.
We hope you will find this issue of the newsletter useful and we encourage to submit information that you think should be shared with the IFRRO community.
All the best, Anita
IP World Day and World Book and Copyright Day 2024
The month of April meant big celebrations for IFRRO and its members as we celebrate both Intellectual Property World (IP) Day and World Book and Copyright Day. Celebrations such as these underscore the importance of creative works and their impact on society. In addition, they offer an opportunity to reflect upon how society values the various sectors involved. Our goal at IFRRO is and will continue being to build a world where creators and publishers are recognised and have fair pay conditions that reflect the role they play in building plural, just and democratic societies.
From our side, this year we highlighted World Book and Copyright Day via our LinkedIn page and we also posted an article about our main focus regarding the achievements of United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which you can read here.
As announced to members in mid-April, Catherine Starkie, IFRRO’s Head of Legal Affairs, who has been with IFRRO since 2017, has taken the decision to leave IFRRO for personal reasons. Catherine has informed us that she is not going on to another job at this time, but recent developments mean that she needs to spend more time with her family and she wishes to take the time to focus on the important priorities in her life right now.
We all thank Catherine for her enormous contributions to the IFRRO membership throughout the past years. The IFRRO Secretariat has been incredibly lucky to have had the privilege to work with Catherine, and we wish Catherine all the very best for the future. We all look forward to staying in touch with her. Catherine will still be with us during the IFRRO mid-year meetings in Valencia, where we will thank her for her contributions, and her last day at IFRRO will be on June 20, 2024.
We look forward to welcome a new colleague in the Secretariat team, Anthi Akritidou, as Senior Legal and Policy Adviser, starting on June 3. Many of you might remember Anthi from her previous internship at the IFRRO Secretariat in 2019. As of June 3, the Secretariat will also welcome Antonios Baris, a Greek lawyer, as an intern for six months.
IFRRO Webinar Series 2024
Our webinar series has continued offering a wide variety of topics of interest to our members. We thank members and colleagues that have made these webinars possible.
The following is a list of upcoming and past webinars since the last issue of the Newsletter:
3 July, 1:00 PM - 2:00 PM CEST, WIPO Arbitration and Mediation Center
28 May, 11:00 -1:30 PM CEST, Seminar on AI - Understanding the value of copyrighted material in AI systems(this seminar is part of the programme of the Mid-Year Meetings in Valencia. While this is an in person meeting, a recording of it will be made available to members shortly after)
2 May, 2:00 - 3:00 PM CEST, OECD AI Policy Observatory
10 April, 10:00 CEST, Implementing the EU Press Publishers’ Right - The Danish experience
Information about the series of webinars, links to register and access to recordings, are all offered via the Members Zonehere.
IFRRO Mid-Year Meetings 2024, Valencia – important information
We have registered over 130 attendees for the meetings in Valencia and we are excited to see many of you very soon. A draft list of participants is available on the Members Zone here.
Agendas and other materials for the different meetings will be made available to members soon. As the Secretariat prepares further logistics for the event, we ask you to please note important information about transportation between the city centre and the meeting venue (both ways) available here.
IWC and GA 2024, Quebec (Canada)
On 24 March, we reminded our members to save the date and to start booking accommodation for our 2024 World Congress and General Assembly (30 September - 3 October, Quebec, Canada). Due to high demand of additional dates for delegates planning arrive in Quebec earlier or depart later, new special conditions for the bookings at the conference hotel, Hôtel Château Laurier, have been added. Please check the updated document and the latest version of the timetable for the congress here.
Registrations will open early June and IFRRO members will be able to register until 6 September.
The IFRRO Asia Pacific Committee recently met in Hong Kong hosted by our member HKRRLS. The meeting offered a great opportunity for our members to discuss current challenges impacting our sector. We were also honoured to welcome Mr Raistlin Chun Lau, Hong Kong SAR Government’s Under Secretary for Culture, Sports and Tourism, who presented an overview of Hong Kong’s vision to become a regional IP trading hub. Amongst other guest speakers from Hong Kong, Mr David Wong (Director at the Intellectual Property Department) gave an impressive presentation highlighting the IP-intensive industries contribute 33% of Hong Kong’s GDP. We were delighted to welcome WIPO Copyright IT Manager, Mr Michel Allain, who shared an update on key activities in the Asia Pacific region as well as an overview of WIPO’s rights management IT solution, WIPO Connect.
*To facilitate more targeted discussions of current priorities, this year the Committee for Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) will be divided into two groups: Latin American and Caribbean. Latin American members will be meeting in Lima while our Caribbean members will meet towards the end of the year.
Since early 2023 IFRRO has offered a tailored mentoring program for some of our ASEAN members (FILCOLS, VIETRRO, MARC, and PRCI). Coinciding with the Asia Pacific Meeting in Hong Kong, we hosted an in-person workshop for project participants on 24th April, and were pleased to also be joined by representatives from new APC members, ERRA.
Advocacy is one of the most important and impactful lines of work of IFRRO. During this period, our activities included the following:
IFRRO attended and represented its members at the Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights (SCCR) of WIPO. Tracey Armstrong, IFRRO’s First Vice-President Samantha Holman, and IFRRO’s CEO Anita Huss-Ekerhult, participated in the meetings April 15 to 19, 2024. Topics of the meeting included exceptions and limitations, copyright in the digital environment, Public Lending Right (PLR), Artists Resale Right (ARR), as well as Artificial Intelligence (AI). IFRRO presented four statements which you can read here.
In addition, joint statements ahead of the SCCR were also summitted. More on these statements can be found here and here.
IFRRO's President of the Board of Directors, Tracey Armstrong, was invited to speak at the 9th Conversation on AI and Frontier Technologies on 13 and 14 March, 2024. Organised by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) and entitled “Training the Machines: Bytes, Rights and the Copyright Conundrum”, the conference had as goal to offer a holistic understanding of the impact of training data on IP landscape. The event allowed attendees to evaluate current practices, propose practical solutions, and envision future directions.
WIPO has published a new IP Policy Toolkit for regulators and IP offices, and a new guide to help enterprises and entrepreneurs assess and mitigate IP risks when adopting AI tools. In addition, a WIPO AI Economic Report is available here.
IFRRO AI page on the Members Zone
IFRRO monitors and gathers relevant information about AI. Our members can find the latest AI updates on the Members Zone here. Also, we invite IFRRO members to share any AI-related information with our community.
The following are a few of the activities that the Secretariat attended recently:
Back in February, IFRRO Members were asked to update their organisation's data in our website. Although the deadline to update expired recently, we encourage all members to keep their pages updated regardless of the cited deadline. This information is extremely helpful for the Secretariat's work. Please contact us if you need assistance when updating your page.
During its February meeting, the IFRRO Board of Directors approved revised documents related to the Development Fund. Interested members should visit the section "Development Work" in the Members Zone to learn more about the Development Fund documents and how to apply.
In late March, we launched a set of three regional leaflets, explaining the importance of collective licensing in different parts of the world: Africa, Asia-Pacific, and Latin America and the Caribbean. These leaflets, with translations in French and Spanish for Africa and Latin America and the Caribbean, can be downloaded from the "Resources" section of the Members Zone. We invite members to make use of these materials as they offer a short explanation on collective management and its impact in different regions of the World.
Our mailing address is:
International Federation of Reproduction Rights Organisations (IFRRO)
Rue du Prince Royal 85- 87
1050 Brussels - Belgium
Phone: +32 2 234 62 60
Since early 2023 IFRRO has offered a tailored mentoring program for some of our ASEAN members (FILCOLS, VIETRRO, MARC, and PRCI). Coinciding with the Asia Pacific Meeting in Hong Kong, we hosted an in-person workshop for project participants on 24th April, and were pleased to also be joined by representatives from new APC members, ERRA. 
In late March, we launched a set of three regional leaflets, explaining the importance of collective licensing in different parts of the world: Africa, Asia-Pacific, and Latin America and the Caribbean. These leaflets, with translations in French and Spanish for Africa and Latin America and the Caribbean, can be downloaded from the "
