Economic Significance

Innovativeness and creativity supported by creation and distribution of intellectual property make a crucial driver of development and economic growth in the world today.

Counterfeiting and piracy of protected subject matters of intellectual property rights is a global problem, which can have negative effects on health and safety of citizens, on crops and the environment, it poses a threat to the development of the economy, it causes losses of workplaces and impairs the established system of intellectual property protection and fair market competition. It is important to know that these infringements often result from committing a criminal offence, and a significant share of counterfeits originate from countries outside of the European Union.

Industries that extensively use intellectual property have an important role in the economy of the European Union (EU) considering their contribution of 47 % in the total GDP of the EU and of almost 40 % in the total employment. Protection and efficient enforcement of intellectual property rights help achieve an increase in economic activities, investments, employment and productivity, for small and medium-sized enterprises as well, among others.

Recently conducted research shows that approximately 86 million counterfeits were seized in the EU during 2022, estimated to a total of over €2 billion. Illicit trade of counterfeits is estimated to account for 5.8 % of trade in the EU.

In 2023, following customs monitoring of goods imported into Croatia, 246,452 pieces of counterfeit goods in total were stopped and destroyed, in the retail sale value of €4,254,608.65, whereas on the inland market, based on the control of infringement in the field of intellectual property, there were goods in the total value of €526,895.11 temporarily seized, which indicates a global problem of counterfeiting and piracy being present in Croatia as well, exerting a negative influence on the development of the Croatian economy too. Detailed information is  available in the Statistical Report on the Infringements of Intellectual Property Rights.

In Croatia, industries based on copyright and related rights also suffer damage from unauthorised use of protected subject matters, particularly IPTV piracy (IPTV- Internet Protocol Television), from unauthorised sharing of large-scale databases that contain copyright content (peer-to-peer networks) and other infringements, which is evidenced by the results of coordinated actions conducted during 2024 with Croatian authorities participating therein.