DALIAN -- Applications for trademark registration in China increased 10.6 percent in the first four months from a year earlier and will maintain fast growth, a government official said on Friday.

Data showed that the country had 6.4 million registered trademarks by the end of 2012, ranking it first in the world.

However, "Only a few of them are of international competitiveness and world influence," said Liu Junchen, deputy director of the State Administration for Industry & Commerce.

Since the country's reform and opening-up in the late 1970s, the annual number of applications reached nearly 1.65 million by the end of 2012, from 20,800 at the end of 1983.

Liu said China needs a number of competitive world-famous trademarks and a market environment for fair competition to become "a great power of

Meanwhile, the country will continue to clamp down on trademark violations, he said.