Music Copyrights Protection

Although most don’t know about copy rights for music, it does exist here in Zambia. ZAMCOPS (standing for Zambian Music Copyright Protection Society) had its roots back in the 1987 and was officially formed in 1994 with the purpose of representing composers, authors, and publishers of music in Zambia.

Throughout the world, those playing music from any artist (whose work is not registered as royalty free) in a public place must have a license from a local governing body. Here in Zambia, ZAMCOPS is the governing body that regulates the playing of musician’s work in public places like TV stations, radio stations, restaurants, shops, bars or in fact any public place.

ZAMCOPS claims to have affiliate agreements with international music industries such as SEASAC so that through this agreement a ZAMCOPS license will allow for public playing of musician’s work from anywhere in the world.

In other words, after paying the k3,000/year license fee, not only can a local station play any song from the 2,000 Zambian artists already signed up with ZAMCOPS, but they can also play songs from around the world!

All this so that artists both locally and abroad can benefit any time their song is aired…

If you are an artist and not yet registered with ZAMCOPS, check them out at zamcops.org and see what you think.