In the October 2003 issue of Sinorama, in a discussion of sales of traditional-character and simplified-character books in Taiwan, the text reads in part "...and publishers are demanding that the Government Information Office come up with new regulations governing import of books from the PRC, enforce them rigorously, and block dumping of these books in Taiwan." This gives the erroneous impression that our department has done nothing whatsoever by way of regulation in this area.
Our department began to allow imports of simplified character college- and university-level textbooks on July 8. Since then we have acted to amend the rules governing the importation, sale, use, or display of mainland publications, films, and videos in Taiwan. We have also set up a copyright database, including cases in which Taiwan publishers have granted or sold publishing rights to mainland firms, in which mainland firms have granted or sold publishing rights to Taiwan firms, or in which overseas publishers have secured the rights to publish traditional-character material for the Taiwan Area. In all cases listed in the database, companies may not import simplified character editions of the books involved. More than 400 cases are currently listed, and at a conference convened by our department, importers agreed to cooperate with this policy in order to uphold the rights of domestic publishers. In the future, our department will join in the meetings convened by the Intellectual Property Office of the Ministry of Economic Affairs to collectively devise solutions on this issue.
The above are the actions taken so far by our department. We ask that you publish this letter so that publishers will be correctly informed as to the seriousness and determination with which the government is addressing this issue.
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