ICTSD - The International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development

Hong Kong Trade and Development Symposium

Session 4.3

Recovering Multilateralism in IP Policy Making: Can the WTO Deliver?

15 December 2005, 10:15-12:45, Room 402

Synopsis

In the past decade, there have been an ever increasing number of bilateral and regional free trade agreements (FTAs). This is due in part to growing frustration of some WTO Member countries about the WTO negotiating process, ranging from the slow progress in reducing agricultural subsidies to continuing deadlocks on sensitive issues such as those related to intellectual property (IP). In this context, FTAs have increasingly become one of the main alternatives for governments to pursue their trade agendas. However, there has been much concern regarding the trend of tightened IP regulations beyond the minimum standards established by TRIPS (TRIPS-plus) through FTAs and the potential detriment to developing countries. Specifically, emphasis has been placed on the impacts of TRIPS-plus provisions on access to medicines or the reduction in the flexibility of countries to define patentability requirements according to their domestic industrial needs.

In light of this trend there has never been a greater need for the TRIPS Council to achieve progress. A successful elaboration on issue areas that are currently deadlocked could help re-establish confidence in the multilateral system and thus reduce potentially damaging agreements made in bilateral/regional contexts. This session will analyse the latest developments in the TRIPS Council in light of the Doha Mandate, the main proposals to date and will identify the respective deliverables on IP and sustainable development in the Doha Round negotiations.

The three most important pending IP issues in the Doha Round Agenda include: a) a permanent solution to Paragraph 6 of the Doha Declaration on TRIPS and Public Health; b) solutions for a multilateral system of notification and registers of GIs for wines and spirits as well as a potential extension of the coverage of GI protection; c) disclosure of the source, or country of origin, of biological materials and/or traditional knowledge used in patented inventions. This session will address the main policy concerns and solutions for promoting pro-sustainable development results in the WTO negotiations in the field of health and GIs. A separate session at the TDS on "Disclosure of Origin - A Deal Maker in Hong Kong?" will take place on 14 December at 16:45h in Room 401, covering this issue comprehensively.

Synopsis | Agenda | Speakers Bios | Organisers | Documents

Agenda

Chairperson: Ricardo Meléndez-Ortiz, Executive Director, ICTSD

Opening comments

Roundtable/Panel on IP Bilateral and Multilateral Policy - What is the Role of the WTO in Future IP Policy Making? by Peter Drahos, Director of the Centre for Governance of Knowledge and Development and Head of Program of the Regulatory Institutions Network, Australian National University

Finding a Permanent Solution to the Paragraph 6 of the TRIPS and Public Health Declaration by Carlos Correa, Director of the Center for Interdisciplinary Studies of Industrial Property Law and Economics, Universidad de Buenos Aires

Options for a Multilateral System for Notification and Registers of GIs for Wines and Spirits and a Potential Extension on the Coverage of GIs Protection by Frederick Abbott, Edward Ball Eminent Scholar Professor of International Law, Florida State University

Commentators:
Felix Addor, Director, Legal and International Affairs Division General Counsel of the Swiss Federal Institute for Intellectual Property
Peter K. Yu, Associate Professor of Law & Director, Intellectual Property & Communications Law Program, Michigan State University College of Law

Comments and Discussions

Synopsis | Agenda | Speakers Bios | Organisers | Documents

Speakers Bios

Ricardo MELENDEZ-ORTIZ is co-founder and first Executive Director of the International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development, since 1996. Previously he has in turn been involved in strategic stakeholder positions of the international negotiations system: as Director co-founder and General Director, Fundacion Futuro Latinoamericano (1994-1996, Quito, Ecuador); as a delegate and principal negotiator for Colombia for the Uruguay Round, the UNCED negotiations and other bilateral and plurilateral processes; as spokesman for G-77, non-aligned countries and regional groupings (1988-1994); and as a consultant for an International Organisation, UNDTCP. He has also served in his country's government as Principal Advisor to the Colombian Minister of Economic Development and on several boards and policy committees of Colombia (1987-1988 Bogota). He undertook graduate studies in Administration and Management, at Harvard University; undergraduate studies in Economics and Political Science at Los Andes University, Bogota-Colombia; and holds a Bachelor of Arts in Social Sciences from Harvard University.

Peter DRAHOS is Director of the Centre for Governance of Knowledge and Development and the Head of Program of the Regulatory Institutions Network at the Australian National University. His former positions include Herchel Smith Senior Research Fellow in Intellectual Property at the Centre for Commercial Law Studies, Queen Mary College, University of London and officer of the Australian Commonwealth Attorney-General's Department. He holds degrees in law, politics and philosophy and is admitted as a barrister and solicitor. He has published widely in law and social science journals on a variety of topics including contract, legal philosophy, telecommunications, intellectual property, trade negotiations and international business regulation. He has worked as a consultant on international intellectual property issues for a number of organizations, including the European Commission, the UK Commission on Intellectual Property Rights, the Commonwealth Secretariat, Oxfam and the ASEAN Secretariat.

Carlos CORREA is the Director of the Center for Interdisciplinary Studies of Industrial Property Law and Economics, University of Buenos Aires. He is currently in charge of the project on Intellectual Property and Innovation at the South Centre. He is a consultant to various agencies of the United Nations, the Latin American Economic System (SELA), the Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity and other regional and international organizations. Professor Correa also served as an Undersecretary of State and Development for Informatics of Argentina (1984-1989), and was a government delegate for Argentina in the negotiations of the Washington Treaty and of the TRIPs Agreement during the Uruguay Round. He is the author of numerous books and articles on technology and intellectual property.

Frederick ABBOTT is Edward Ball Eminent Scholar Professor of International Law at the Florida State University College of Law. He is Rapporteur for the Committee on International Trade Law of the International Law Association, on the Panel of Experts of UNCTAD's Program on the Settlement of Disputes in International Trade, Investment and Intellectual Property, consultant to the UNCTAD Project on TRIPS and Development, to the World Bank Institute and to the Quaker United Nations Office (Geneva). He has served as consultant to the WHO Department of Essential Drugs and Medicines Policy. Professor Abbott is the author of numerous books and articles in the fields of international economic law, international intellectual property rights law, and public international law. Professor Abbott regularly teaches on the faculties of the World Trade Institute in Berne and the Central European University - World Law Institute in Budapest. Professor Abbott holds BA and LLM degrees from UC Berkeley and a JD from Yale Law School.

Peter K. Yu is Associate Professor of Law and the founding director of the nationally-ranked Intellectual Property & Communications Law Program at Michigan State University College of Law. He holds a courtesy appointment in the Department of Telecommunication, Information Studies and Media in the College of Communication Arts & Sciences at Michigan State University. He is also a member of the affiliated faculty of the Working Group on Property, Citizenship, and Social Entrepreneurism at Syracuse University College of Law and a research fellow of the Center for Studies of Intellectual Property Rights at Zhongnan University of Economics and Law in Wuhan, China. Born and raised in Hong Kong, Professor Yu is a leading expert in international intellectual property and communications law. He also writes extensively and lectures frequently on international trade and the transition of the legal systems in China and Hong Kong. An editor or coeditor of three books, Professor Yu has spoken at events organized by the ITU, UNCTAD and WIPO and at leading research institutions from around the world. His publications are available on his Web site at www.peteryu.com.

Felix ADDOR is Director, Legal and International Affairs Division
General Counsel of the Swiss Federal Institute for Intellectual Property and executive board member. Dr. iur., mediator, notary public. He was research and teaching assistant, Institute for Swiss and International Civil Procedure and Private International Law, University of Berne and Staff member, Swiss Federal Office of Intellectual Property (since 1996: Swiss Federal Institute of Intellectual Property). Mr. Addor is also professor at the EIAB in Zurich, the World Trade Institute in Bern.

Synopsis | Agenda | Speakers Bios | Organisers | Documents

Organisers

	ICTSD: The International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development (ICTSD) was established in Geneva in September 1996 to contribute to a better understanding of development and environment concerns in the context of international trade. As an independent non-profit and non-governmental organisation, ICTSD engages a broad range of actors in ongoing dialogue about trade and sustainable development. With a wide network of governmental, non-governmental and inter-governmental partners, ICTSD plays a unique systemic role as a provider of original, non-partisan reporting and facilitation services at the intersection of international trade and sustainable development.
	QIAP: The Quaker International Affairs Programme (QIAP) works to support the peace and justice concerns of Canadian Quakers in the international arena. Its first area of focus is on trade and intellectual property issues. QIAP was established in Ottawa in November 2001. QIAP is a programme under the Canadian Friends Service Committee which is the service arm of Canadian Yearly Meeting (the corporate body of the Religious Society of Friends, or Quakers, in Canada). QIAP's work priorities are based on the concerns of Canadian Quakers and determined, in part, by the agendas of the organizations and participants with which QIAP works.
	QUNO: The Quaker United Nations Office, located in Geneva and New York, represents Quakers through Friends World Committee for Consultation (FWCC). Since the founding of the United Nations in 1945, Quakers have shared that organisation's aims and supported its efforts to abolish war and promote peaceful resolution of conflicts, human rights, economic justice and good governance.