Under intellectual property law, owners are granted certain exclusive rights to a variety of intangible assets, such as musical, literary, and artistic works; discoveries and inventions; and words, phrases, symbols, and designs. Common types of intellectual property include copyrights, trademarks, patents, industrial design rights and trade secrets. Intellectual property law involves advising and assisting individuals and businesses on the development, use, and protection of intellectual property -- which includes ideas, artistic creations, engineering processes, scientific inventions, and more.
Farmerville is a town in and the parish seat of Union Parish, Louisiana, United States. The population was 3,808 at the 2000 census. It is part of the Monroe Metropolitan Statistical Area. The Pilgrim's Pride poultry processing and protein conversion plant in Farmerville was slated for closure early in 2009, along with other company operations in nearby Arcadia in Bienville Parish, Athens in Claiborne Parish, and Choudrant in Union Parish. The closures impacted some 1,300 jobs in North Louisiana. Several weeks later, however, Pilgrim's Pride accepted an $80 million offer from Foster Farms of California to purchase the operations. In addition, to the 1,300 direct jobs, the purchase spares the small farms of some three hundred independent growers. Foster Farms put up $40 million and the State of Louisiana a matching $40 million. Foster Farms will further invest $10 million in capital improvements at the Farmerville plant, to be matched by the state, in an agreement announced by Governor Bobby Jindal.