This report was prepared by the OECD Public Governance Directorate, under the leadership of Elsa Pilichowski, Public Governance Director and Martin Forst, Head of the Governance Reviews and Partnerships division, together with the European Observatory on Infringements of Intellectual Property Rights, led by its Director Paul Maier, at the the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO).
At the OECD this study was conducted under the auspices of the Task Force on Countering Illicit Trade (TF-CIT). It was shared with other OECD committees with relevant expertise in the areas of trade, regulatory policy, consumer protection policy, product safety and public sector integrity.
The report was prepared by Piotr Stryszowski, Senior Economist and Morgane Gaudiau, Economist at the OECD Directorate for Public Governance jointly with Michał Kazimierczak, Economist at the European Observatory on Infringements of Intellectual Property Rights of the EUIPO and Nathan Wajsman, Chief Economist, EUIPO. Peter Avery, Senior Consultant provided valuable inputs. The authors wish to thank the OECD experts who provided valuable knowledge and insights: János Bertok, Julio Bacio Terracino, and Nick Malyshev from the OECD Public Governance Directorate, Silvia Sorescu from the OECD Trade Directorate and Brigitte Acoca and Nicholas McSpedden-Brown from the OECD Directorate for Science, Technology and Innovation.
The authors would also like to thank experts from the OECD member countries and participants of several seminars and workshops for their valuable assistance. Special expressions of appreciation are given to Kerry Manion from the US Food and Drug Administration and to Sergio Tirro, Monica De Astis and Aikaterini Giannelou from Europol.
Kevin Mushi served as a research assistant and Ciara Muller and Andrea Uhrhammer provided editorial and production support.
The database on customs seizures was provided by the World Customs Organization (WCO) and supplemented with regional data submitted by the European Commission's Directorate-General for Taxation and Customs Union, the US Customs and Border Protection Agency and the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The authors express their gratitude for the data and for the valuable support of these institutions.