New Zealand’s Intellectual Property Office has declined an application to register “Manuka Honey” as a trade mark, delivering a legal victory to Australian producers who have argued the product is not unique to New Zealand.
(Bloomberg) — New Zealand’s Intellectual Property Office has declined an application to register “Manuka Honey” as a trade mark, delivering a legal victory to Australian producers who have argued the product is not unique to New Zealand.
The decision released Monday in Wellington is the latest step in proceedings that began after a group of New Zealand honey producers sought to prevent their Australian counterparts from using the description in various countries. The application was lodged in 2015 by the Manuka Honey Appellation Society and opposed by the Australian Manuka Honey Association.
In the decision, the Assistant Commissioner of Trade Marks, Natasha Alley, found that the term manuka honey was simply descriptive rather than having any distinctiveness, and therefore didn’t qualify as a trade mark. Both parties are able to appeal.
“I am not satisfied, on the balance of probabilities, that by the relevant date there was an appreciation, among average New Zealand consumers, that ‘manuka honey’ signified more than a generic term for a type of honey,” Alley said. “This issue is finely balanced but overall I consider that MHAS has not established that ‘manuka honey’ has acquired distinctiveness under the Act as a result of either use of that term, or any other circumstance.”
Manuka honey, sought after for its antibacterial properties and purported health benefits, is made by bees that pollinate the Leptospermum scoparium, or manuka tree, which grows throughout New Zealand and in some parts of Australia. Both countries are chasing a share of lucrative global market which is being fanned by Chinese demand.
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The 171-page decision says that New Zealand’s manuka honey industry was initially more advanced than Australia’s. But Australian producers were using the term prior to the trade mark application being submitted.
“Savvy marketing by Australian honey producers does not equate to dishonest trading on their part,” Alley said. “Nor does it justify registration of a purely descriptive word by MHAS as a certification mark in New Zealand.”
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