She (IP) Matters

In business, politics and society as a whole, we can only reach our full potential if we use all of our diversity. Using only half of the population, half of the ideas is not good enough. International Women’s Day is a chance to celebrate achievements and look at the road ahead. We still have a long way to go: statistics from the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) show that, women’s share in international patent applications was 16.5% in 2021. Women inventors matter, unfortunately inequalities persist. There is still a long way to go, both on IP protection and gender equality.

In the context of International Women’s Day 2022, Ms. Helene Juramy, the IP Officer in the Trade Section of the Delegation of European Union to China, gave a speech at "The Fourth Conference on Women’s Achievements in IPR". She highlighted that IP intensive industries were especially valuable to face challenges such as climate change and health care and encouraged more women to actively participate in the creation of IP and innovation defying the existing barriers in the IP journey ahead.

IP Key China, an EU-funded project on IP cooperation, supports gender equality to build a more inclusive and diversified IP ecosystem where women inventors can achieve their full potential.