Challenges to Effective Legal Protection of Industrial Designs in Nigeria

Abstract

Industrial designs are primarily those elements incorporated into mass produced products that aim to enhance their attractiveness by their appearance. The primary objective of the law governing industrial design is to protect a design that is new or essentially better in some ways than what was created before. Despite the importance of the law governing industrial design and the protection of infringement of industrial design in Nigeria, it is however very sad that the rate of infringement of industrial design is on the increase. This is due to the fact of some challenges to effective legal protection of industrial designs in Nigeria. In this paper we will be looking at the meaning of industrial design, when an industrial design will be deemed registrable, non registrable designs, categories of persons who may apply to register an industrial designs, duration and renewal of industrial designs, extent of the right/protection conferred upon the proprietor of an industrial design, challenges to effective protection of industrial design and the recommendations on how to tackle these challenges.