{"id":14186,"date":"2022-04-25T09:24:17","date_gmt":"2022-04-25T09:24:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/liberia\/all-news\/cosol-urges-stakeholders-participation-in-ending-piracy"},"modified":"2022-04-25T09:44:18","modified_gmt":"2022-04-25T09:44:18","slug":"cosol-urges-stakeholders-participation-in-ending-piracy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/liberia\/all-news\/cosol-urges-stakeholders-participation-in-ending-piracy","title":{"rendered":"COSOL urges stakeholders\u2019 participation in ending piracy"},"content":{"rendered":"

Africa-Press – Liberia. <\/strong><\/span>The Copyright Society of Liberia (COSOL) for the first time joined the World in celebrating World\u2019s Copyright and Book Day aimed at raising awareness on piracy, respecting and protecting the intellectual property of the arts and crafts sector.<\/p>\n

The celebration of the day is also aimed at ensuring that those in the arts and crafts sector benefit from their works and celebrate legendary literary and artistic works across the globe.<\/p>\n

The program was held in the open air on Broad and Randall Street, adjacent to the Executive Pavilion where several Liberians stopped to watch the brilliant performance and display by musicians and other creative workers.<\/p>\n

The program was celebrated under the theme: Adding Value to Creativity for Wealth Creation in Liberia.\u201d COSOL is the secretariat within the Copyright Department of the Liberia Intellectual Property Office (LIPO). COSOL is headed by Executive Director, Prince Emmanuel Decker.<\/p>\n

In 1995, UNESCO declared April 23 as World Book and Copyright Day, dedicated to promoting reading, publishing and the protection of intellectual property worldwide.<\/p>\n

Intellectual Property has contributed greatly to the national and global economy. It\u2019s important to commemorate World Copyright day and raise the awareness of the whole society to respect and protect intellectual property.<\/p>\n

In an effort geared toward rebranding Liberia\u2019s creative sector with the purpose of adding value to the works of creative Liberians as well as protecting their intellectual properties for economic benefits, the day brought together several creative arts and crafts workers including the Musician Union of Liberia, Liberia Movies Union, Liberia D.J Association, and Liberia Association of Writers, among others.<\/p>\n

Also in attendance were Mr. Li Jiang, Economic and Commercial Counselor of the Chinese Embassy to Liberia, former Liberian Movie Union President and Liberia International actors Frank Artus, Mr. Eddie M. Gibson, President of Liberia Movies Union and several others.<\/p>\n

The Executive Director of the Copyright Society of Liberia, Mr. Prince Emmanuel Decker said he is very excited that after many, many years Liberians can join the rest of the world in celebration of World Copyright and Book Day.<\/p>\n

He said it is very instrumental to celebrate and recognize all those that have made an impact and continue to make an impact internationally and locally in literary and artistic works.<\/p>\n

According to him, they will make sure that every April 23 is celebrated and even decentralized across the country to raise awareness of the creative works of Liberians in order to attract economic benefit to them and have their works and thoughtss protected.<\/p>\n

\u201cBeginning January we have been through licensing process where we encouraged all users of creative works to ensure they have operating licenses,\u201d Mr. Decker explained.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are trying to address piracy from the licensing process and the good policy we have drafted at COSOL. We want to ensure that all Liberians in the creative sector benefit from their thoughts and it\u2019s protected by us to translate it into money for them,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

He called for citizens\u2019 participation and urged them to help improve this sector. For his part, Mr. Li Jiang of the Chinese Embassy expressed excitement and happiness to form part of the celebration of this day, noting that it\u2019s important that society respects and protects intellectual property.<\/p>\n

According to Jiang, intellectual property protection is as important to Liberia as it is to China, adding that strengthening IP protection will help give a strong impetus to the high-quality economic social department of Liberia.<\/p>\n\r\n