This week, ECTA met in Brussels with the European Commission (DG AGRI and DG GROW) to exchange views and discuss updates on a range of important topics, including:

• Reforms on designs, patents, and non-agri Gis;
• Updates on IP enforcement and evaluation of EUTMR and IPRED;
• Plans and developments in the area of IP valuation and SME support;
• Issues on the intersection of domain names and GIs, use of GIs in the labelling and advertising and treatment of GIs under various bilateral and multilateral international agreements;
• As well as other topics of interest to our members and related to ongoing projects within various ECTA Committees.

The ECTA delegation included Carina Gommers (President), Paola Ruggiero (1st Vice President), Benjamin Fontaine (2nd Vice President), Julien Scicluna (Secretary General), Klaudia Błach Morysińska (Treasurer), Anna Ostanina (Head of Legal Affairs), Aitor Pomares (Chair of the Geographical Indications Committee), and Peter Lukacsi (Chair of the IP Valuation Task Force).

In addition, in a productive meeting in Brussels, the Board of Directors and Secretariat fine-tuned the details for the promising #ECTA44 Annual Conference in Dublin and discussed other strategic priorities for the months ahead.