While much progress has been made in the areas of trademark law harmonization and the consistent treatment of domestic and foreign trademark owners, much remains to be done. The scope of what can be protected is an example of where improvement can be made. Originally, only trademarks were protected. Over the past years, however, protection for service marks has been introduced in many countries, but not in all. Nations that utilize the Nice Classification, for example, would appear to undertake to abide by the spirit of the Agreement, and allow registration of service marks. Some, however, do not. Likewise, some countries that recognize service marks do not recognize protection for retail store services, thereby limiting service mark protection in ways that do not reflect the realities of today’s commercial patterns. Trademark owners and practitioners who wish to obtain protection for such services are required to file in respect of the goods to be sold, which affords some, but not complete, protection. Since manufacturers of goods now often have their own retail outlets for the sale of such goods, the harmonization of national laws allowing for the protection of retail store services would be a welcome advance.

Trademark infringement and piracy in certain regions of the world has become an exceedingly volatile issue of late. This is not because there has not always been piracy, but rather because of increased global economic activity and the increasing economic importance of some of the regions in which piracy and infringement are rife. Over the past years, piracy has cost foreign intellectual property owners billions of dollars in lost sales and can even cause political tension between nations, as shown from time to time by the diplomatic rows between the United States and the People’s Republic of China.

It is hoped that the WTO will have a positive impact in such cases. The imposition by the WTO of economic sanctions on rogue states would appear to have the potential for serious economic leverage.

In many ways, the development of trademark law has followed the development of commerce, and can be expected to do so, given its importance as a tool for protecting commerce. Harmonization of national trademark laws and the introduction of international intellectual property treaties has progressed significantly, though intermittently, over the past thirty years and can be expected to continue. The ideal trademark regime would be a single global treaty pursuant to which all marks would be registrable and enforceable in the exact same way in all countries. The author risks little in stating that this probably will not happen in the foreseeable future. It is possible, however, for national laws and regional agreements to create a certain degree of harmony so that the trademark owner can have a reasonable expectation of consistent treatment wherever he or she may do business.