Last week on a flight back to Melbourne, passengers were offered Chinese fried fish and vegetables or Malaysian beef semur for lunch. Under normal circumstances I would have good-humoredly dismissed the fact Indonesian semur had somehow become Malaysian with a "what's a cuisine item or two between cultural siblings?" and promptly forgotten about it. However, I have become far more sensitive about such things recently.

I learned about incident after incident like this one while I was in Indonesia, so I now sit up and take notice each time an Indonesian item appears dressed up in another country's name.

While there is widespread unawareness of intellectual property issues among those who produce and practice the creative arts in Indonesia, the relevant authorities -- instead of informing artisans and facilitating the process of registering necessary copyrights and patents -- seem equally unaware of the importance of registering intellectual property.

Officials complicate matters by giving the few enlightened applicants who inquire the proverbial runaround. Meanwhile business owners from other countries who are good at spotting interesting and unusual things have been relatively unhindered in registering Indonesian creative works and properties in other countries.

Once the copyright or patent of a creation or intellectual property is registered overseas, further production will cost more as producers will have to pay a royalty to the owner of the copyright or patent.

One such instance has caused concern among many goldsmiths and silversmiths in Bali. Their work, based on Balinese traditional motifs, has been patented by overseas companies. The motifs, once "owned" and freely used by generations of Balinese artisans, have become too expensive to use because the Balinese can no longer claim them.

Even though the artisans in the field are worried, the relevant government authorities appear unfazed.

Eighteen years ago, chemical engineer Grace Tarjoto and her husband Heru, an environmental and tool design engineer, visited Bali and decided to settle there. They chose Jatiluwih in Tabanan as their new home. Jatiluwih happens to be the center of red rice cultivation on the island.

Some local farmers recounted, in the 1970s, farmers in other areas had given up red rice farming, which yields harvests only once a year, because it was far less profitable than growing white rice harvested three times a year using seeds promoted by the government as part of the Green Revolution.

However, the Jatiluwih farmers' devotion to their red rice stood them in good stead. When paddies throughout Bali were nearly destroyed by the brown planthopper pest hama wereng and had to be rescued by pesticide mass-sprayed from helicopters, the Jatiluwih red rice fields were hardly affected. Heru has a scientific explanation for this.

The Jatiluwih farmers succeeded in fighting hama wereng without resorting to chemical pesticides. Unlike other farmers, they had not eliminated the creatures regarded elsewhere as pests. The birds are free to catch the worms, the frogs eat the insects, the snakes eat the frogs, the eels help keep the soil fertile, and so on.

The Tarjotos realized the farmers were disadvantaged by selling red rice at the same price as white rice since they only harvested once a year. So Heru designed a mill which allowed the red rice to keep its red-gold husk while shedding all the unwanted dirt, making it a delicacy. They were then able to buy the rice at a higher price from the farmers, who were delighted at the improvement to their lives, and distribute the rice throughout the country.

The Tarjotos were keen to export red rice overseas. Aware of the risk of someone seizing it and patenting it, Grace sought to have it registered in the Geographical Index, thus getting legal recognition for red rice as a product of Jatiluwih.

However, when she tried to obtain the necessary documents from the regional government, she was shunted from one department to another and had to pay various fees. She is still waiting.

Another example of a business owner who has waited more than a year for a patent is Reki Mayangsari of Ladybamboo Villa in Ubud.

Mayangsari told me about an incident which jolted her out of her complacence. In 1999 she went to Toraja and stayed at the Novotel Hotel. On a rafting trip she saw the logo she had designed herself on the hotel's lunch box. On returning to the hotel, she saw her logo again in its Bamboo Bar.

She promptly confronted the general manager about the appropriation of her design. Being honest, and probably taken aback by Mayangsari's assertiveness, the French manager by the name of Fabrice showed his good faith by withdrawing the logo from the hotel property.

When Mayangsari investigated, she found the source of the problem. Two years before she had been conducting research in Toraja and went to a printer to have some business cards made. Without her knowledge, the printer allegedly kept the design. When Novotel contacted them to have a design made, they presented her logo to Novotel as their creation.

The incident prompted Mayangsari to have her logo patented. She contacted the relevant authorities but a year and a half later after much to-ing and fro-ing and various fees, she is still waiting.

One would think copyright and patent registration would be a fairly straightforward matter as it is elsewhere, but apparently not in Indonesia.

In the meantime, we keep seeing Indonesian creations, even traditional properties, being patented by overseas companies.

Are we that slow to learn?

The writer is a journalist.

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