Whenever anyone points to the fragility of his business empire, in terms of losses or lack of tangible assets, Mr Branson points to the intangiblebenefit locked up in his brands.
Independent firms benefit from full expensing of their intangible drilling costs, while the integrated firms can expense only 70 percent of their IDCs and must write off the rest over a five- year period.
The strategic emphasis of the Office in the coming years will lie on strengthening capacities of different stakeholders to safeguard intangible cultural heritage at the national level, and to benefit effectively from the opportunities and mechanisms of international cooperation created by the 2003 Convention, now successfully ratified by all Member States of the SEE region.