Panel discusses involvement of music sector in economic activities

NON-extractive sector such as the music industry can also help the government in carrying out its agenda’s in terms of creating economic activities, says a panelist.
Patent layer Oala Moi said this when speaking during a panel discussion this week during the World Micro Small Medium Enterprise (MSME) and PNG Small Medium Enterprise (SME) business breakfast in Port Moresby.
Moi said there were PNG artists who were generating an income under the copyright laws and could contribute to the economy by bringing in foreign currencies if their songs were aired overseas.
“There are copyright transactions that are taking place right now here in the country and overseas but how do we facilitate that,” he said.
“If Anslom”s (local PNG musician) song hits number one on the American top 40 (music chart list), he makes a minimum of US$5000 (K16,920).
“If his song is featured in a Hollywood production (movie) or a PNG-US production, you are talking about millions of kina.
“How does that money come back to PNG? It is through the injection of foreign currencies.”
Moi said in 2008, there was an amendment bill developed and raised by various musicians in the country to have a system put in place to facilitate copyright transactions but it had not yet been passed.
“If that Amendment Bill is passed it would create a collective management system which is actually a mechanism that facilitates copy right transactions,” he said.
He said this would mean that a musician’s song could not be played without having a license and the person that plays the song could be sued by the musician.
“We don’t have that system but we only have a bill since 2008 and that bill needs to be passed,” he said.
Moi said that if the bill was passed, it would not only help musicians but could also help artists and other content creators in other field like painting, sculpting, graphic designing, wirting, publishing and playwriting.