Every April 26 is World Intellectual Property Day, and Chile is no stranger to the commemoration. Public and private institutions hold seminars, encouraging statistics are published on the steady growth in patent applications, and innovation is praised as an engine of development. Beyond these gestures, however, an uncomfortable reality persists: Chile does not broadly respect intellectual property. This is not an arbitrary opinion but an internationally recognized fact.
Since 2007, Chile has been on the “Priority Watch List” of the annual Special 301 Report issued by the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR). The most recent edition of the report (2023) expressly mentions the country’s lack of concrete progress in key areas such as copyright protection in the digital environment, effective judicial enforcement against piracy, and the use of unlicensed software in the public sector. We share this list with countries such as China, India and Russia; that is, countries kept under heightened scrutiny for their weak or nonexistent respect for intellectual property rights.
This structural deficit is neither harmless nor symbolic. In an uncertain geopolitical context, where economic competition is increasingly expressed through instruments such as tariffs, respect for intellectual property can become a bargaining chip or, worse, a justification for imposing sanctions. Although Chile has so far been among the countries least affected by the protectionist measures implemented by the Trump administration, this is neither a permanent nor a guaranteed condition.
In fact, one of the criteria used by the U.S. and other countries when setting differentiated trade policies is precisely effective adherence to international standards for the protection of intellectual property rights. Just as there are tariff benefits for countries that meet these standards, there are also consequences for those that do not. Ignoring this dimension could become a direct threat to our export capacity, making it even more expensive for Chilean products to enter one of our main markets.
That is why, although increasing the number of domestic patent applications year after year is an excellent indicator, it is not enough. Celebrating these advances is legitimate and necessary, but it can become a form of complacency if it is not accompanied by a real commitment to respecting and protecting these rights.
Intellectual property can no longer be seen as a technical matter reserved for lawyers, academics or innovators. It must be part of the country’s cultural ethos.
This means early education in schools about the importance of respecting other people’s creations, public campaigns against the use of pirated software, incentives for entrepreneurs to build protection strategies from an early stage, and a public commitment from the State to transparency, the ethical use of technology and the proper licensing of digital products.
Moving toward a knowledge-based economy requires more than laws and treaties. It requires political will, strong institutions and, above all, citizens who understand that respecting intellectual property means respecting the work, creativity and investment of others. If we do not close this cultural gap, we risk paying not only with sanctions, but with a loss of credibility that could distance us from the opportunities the knowledge world offers us.
Javier Ramírez
Executive Director, Know Hub Chile
Read the original column at https://opinion.cooperativa.cl/opinion/economia/propiedad-intelectual-entre-el-discurso-y-el-respeto-efectivo/2025-04-29/063332.html
