US Ambassador to Canada speaks about piracy

Andre Yoskowitz
28 May 2007 15:55

Last month, the US Ambassador to Canada, David Wilkins, told the Empire Club that CDN IP piracy was costing the Canadian economy up to $30 Billion a year. Here was his full quote:

And we are working with the Canadian government now on that issue. We have met with Ministers Bernier and Oda and members of the Prime Minister's staff and we are requesting a stronger copyright bill be introduced and be passed.
We are joined by the U.S. and Canadian motion picture and sound recording and computer software industries. Right now the copyright laws or the intellectual property right protection in Canada is considered the weakest of the G-7 countries. So we are asking that be strengthened.
And it really does cost the Canadian economy a huge amount every year. It is estimated to be from some $10 to $30 billion per year.

Yesterday however, the CBC reported that Canadians spend almost $21 billion a year on prescription drugs, a figure that is the third highest per capita in the world behind the US and France.
So if we are to compare these numbers, then it seems that either Canadians engage in piracy that is worth almost $10 billion more than their prescription drug expenditures or maybe that the Ambassador overexaggerated, and by alot, in another ploy to get regular consumers to believe that piracy is more "evil" than it really is.
Source:
P2Pnet