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The Council of Ministers having deliberated;
The National Assembly and the Senate having adopted:
ENACTS:
PART ONE: GENERAL PROVISIONS
ONLY TITLE: PURPOSE AND DEFINITIONS
Article 1:
The purpose of this Law is to organize and protect industrial property. It
regulates in particular the rights relating to patents, utility model certificates,
industrial designs, layout designs for integrated circuits, traditional knowledge,
crafts objects and distinctive signs.
Article 2:
For the purposes of this Law, the following definitions shall apply:
- Budapest Treaty, the Budapest Treaty on the International Recognition of the
Deposit of Microorganisms for the Purposes of Patent Procedure, signed in
Budapest on April 28, 1977 and amended on September 26, 1980;
- Certificate, the title issued to protect a utility model, an industrial design, a
layout design for integrated circuits or a mark. It shall establish a presumption
of the validity and of the possibility of applying the right in order to prohibit
third parties from exploiting the right registered in Burundi. Certificates shall
be issued by the Minister responsible for trade, without incurring the liability
of the Government of Burundi with regard to the conditions for registrability
and the right to titles;
- Certificate of addition, the title issued to protect the right to add to the
invention changes, improvements or additions noted in the certificates issued
in the same form as the primary patent and which produce the same effects as
it does;
- Certification signs, signs or combinations of signs suitable for designating
any characteristic common to goods or services, in particular their quality,
origin or methods of production, and whose use is controlled by the owner of
the signs;
- Collective mark, any mark belonging to a group such as a cooperative,
association or federation of industrialists, producers or merchants;
- Compulsory license, an authorization granted by the competent authority to a
person, company, private entity, an entity held or controlled by the State, for
the exploitation of a patent, a utility model, a layout design or an industrial
design in Burundi without the consent of the right holder;
- Counterfeit branded goods, all goods, including their packaging, which bear,
without authorization, a factory or trademark which is identical to a factory or