The record industry's global lobby was born at a Rome congress in 1933
Every commercially released track carries a unique code, the ISRC, and since 1989 the body that hands those codes out has been the IFPI. Founded in Rome in 1933, it speaks for some 8,000 record companies across more than 70 markets and has shaped the international law protecting sound recordings.
The organisation emerged from the recording industry's first international congress, held in Rome from 10 to 14 November 1933. Its early aims were to push copyright legislation and to win a worldwide performance right for gramophone records, partly to protect what was then a largely British-based business. Today it is a non-profit members' association registered in Switzerland, with a London secretariat and regional offices in cities including Brussels, Hong Kong, Miami and Nairobi.
Its most consequential lobbying came at the Rome Convention of 1961, which set an international standard of protection for recordings, performances and broadcasts. Authors' and composers' groups opposed it, fearing these neighbouring rights would weaken control over their own works and make licensing too expensive. American broadcasters, reluctant to pay for the records they played, helped keep the United States out, and the US did not recognise a separate copyright in sound recordings until 1971. That same year the IFPI championed the Geneva Phonograms Convention against unauthorised copying, signed by 72 countries.
The ISO created the International Standard Recording Code in 1986, and three years later appointed the IFPI to register the codes, which help track use of copyrighted recordings, route royalties and fight piracy. The federation also runs legal and litigation programmes, content protection and market sales reporting.
Membership is open to anyone producing records or music videos released in reasonable quantities, a phrase it never defines. National bodies such as the BPI in Britain, the RIAA in America and RIAJ in Japan belong to its network. A Main Board of label representatives governs it, with regional boards for Asia-Pacific and Latin America. Frances Moore led it from July 2010 until December 2023, following John Kennedy, a co-producer of Live Aid, and Victoria Oakley took over as chief executive in June 2024.
Source: International Federation of the Phonographic Industry
