Shanghai plans to turn itself into the intellectual property center of the Asia-Pacific rim, with an adequate service and protection system by 2020, according a report on the issue released Thursday.

"The center of innovation has been gradually moving from Europe to Asia, and China wants to have more of a say in how the rules are made," said L Guoqiang, head of Shanghai Municipal Intellectual Property Bureau, which issued the report.

The city aims to increase its number of invention patents to 1,200 per 1 million people and its number of registered trademarks to 400,000 by 2020, according to the Shanghai Intellectual Property Strategy Compendium (2011-2020). In 2010, local authorities had issued 299 invention patents per 1 million people and registered 210,000 trademarks.

L said the city's intellectual property protection has improved greatly in recent years, as the number of patents approved in Shanghai has grown 30 percent year-on-year since 2004.

However, he admitted that the lack of innovation, core technology and respect for intellectual property rights (IPR) have been the primary obstacles to Shanghai reaching its goal.

In order to make a favorable environment for intellectual property rights, the bureau plans to strengthen the collaboration with the judicial department to create a mechanism to hold more violators accountable, L said.