WIPO MEMBERS AGREE ON DEVELOPMENT AGENDA

Members of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) last week reached an agreement on recommendations for reforms aimed at ensuring that development concerns are placed at the heart of the work of the UN agency.

In the fourth and final session of the committee dealing with the 'development agenda' talks, held in Geneva from 11-15 June, representatives from over 100 governments successfully negotiated a series of proposals to forward to the 2007 General Assembly, WIPO's top decision-making body. They also agreed to create a new Committee on Development and Intellectual Property.

Many delegates praised the continuation of a cooperative spirit from the previous session of the Provisional Committee on Proposals Related to a WIPO Development Agenda (PCDA) in February, where they had managed to agree on a set of initial recommendations. A developing country delegate said a "good mood" prevailed last week, with all members "flexible and constructive towards an outcome." That the 111 reform proposals submitted by governments over the past two and a half years had been digested into agreed and workable recommendations was widely seen as a giant step forward from the deep divisions a year ago (see BRIDGES Weekly, 5 July 2006, http://www.ictsd.org/weekly/06-07-05/story1.htm).

The recommendations address controversial subjects including WIPO's provision of technical assistance, as well as broadening the organisation's focus on issues such as public domain, competition, and access to knowledge. However, the US released a statement following the conclusion of the meeting stating that whilst the proposals "reinforce WIPO's commitment to the needs of developing countries" they also "reaffirm WIPO's clear mandate as the specialised UN agency that promotes the protection of intellectual property worldwide."

An African delegate described the accord as "a breakthrough by all standards [that] really reflects the level of conviction among all member states on the need to address the existing imbalance between intellectual property rights and the public interest."

Brazil and Argentina originally proposed a Development Agenda for WIPO at the 2004 General Assembly (WO/GA/31/11). They have been joined by 13 other countries - Bolivia, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Egypt, Iran, Kenya, Peru, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Tanzania, Uruguay, and Venezuela - to form a group dubbed the 'Friends of Development' (see BRIDGES Weekly, 6 October 2004, http://www.ictsd.org/weekly/04-10-06/story1.htm). The 2005 General Assembly created the PCDA and charged it with drawing together a cohesive package from the 111 proposals. The committee's mandate was extended for a further year in 2006 after members were unable to make meaningful progress.

Meeting focused on the toughest proposals

The PCDA's final session last week had the task of working through 71 proposals towards an outcome document that could be forwarded to the General Assembly. These proposals were what remained after the committee's February meeting, when delegates boiled down 40 of the 111 proposals into 24 recommendations (see BRIDGES Weekly, 28 February 2007, http://www.ictsd.org/weekly/07-02-28/story1.htm). However, the current set of proposals, contained in 'Annex B' of a working document prepared by previous General Assembly Chair Ambassador Manalo (Philippines), addressed more controversial issues, such as access to knowledge, competition, and collaborative innovation models.

A developed country delegate said that expectations had been surpassed in finding agreement on all aspects of Annex B.

Chairman Clarke guides process with informal sessions

PCDA Chair Ambassador Trevor Clarke (Barbados) continued the 'green room' process - informal negotiations limited to the regional coordinators and a representative selection of key delegations - that had facilitated the breakthrough in February. Clarke had aimed to finish discussing the substantive proposals by mid-week to allow two days to discuss their implementation. However, substantive discussions continued until the final day, with implementation issues receiving attention only at the end; the final plenary accordingly concluded at 10pm. For the rest of the week, plenary sessions were short and spare, with most time invested in regional group sessions and the green room process.

The proposals in Annex B were divided into five issue clusters on technical assistance; norm setting, flexibilities, public policy, and public domain; technology transfer, information technology, and access to knowledge; evaluation; and institutional matters including mandate and governance. A sixth, on 'other issues' present in Manalo's paper, was incorporated into the preamble of the final recommendations. Each cluster was assigned to a different regional group; the coordinators were then tasked with preparing draft proposals in advance of the PCDA. These then became the basis of negotiations in the green room sessions.

The preamble of the text setting out the recommendations calls for the immediate establishment of a WIPO "Committee on IP and Development." The institution's inconsequential Permanent Committee on Cooperation for Development Related to Intellectual Property (PCIPD), into which the US and other Group B (industrialised) countries have previously sought to push the Development Agenda, will cease to exist. The Friends of Development were wary that locating their concerns in the PCIPD would marginalise their objective of mainstreaming development into all of WIPO's activities. The PCDA's work is complete, but a final one-day meeting will be held prior to the General Assembly in September to approve the Chair's report and a list of proposals for immediate implementation.

Civil society groups expressed delight with an outcome that seemed unfeasible not long ago. James Love, director of Knowledge Ecology International, welcomed "a meaningful and welcome new vision for WIPO" that promised to consider "a range of topics, including measures to protect or promote access to knowledge, the implications and benefits of a rich and accessible public domain, and strategies for dealing with abuses of rights, or other measures to protect the public interest." Though compromise was reached by watering down much of the final text, it was important to introduce concepts that WIPO had never broached before, a developing country official said.

Tom Goodwin, UK delegate, said that whilst the outcome does not give WIPO a new mandate, it "sets out a clear message from members, to each other and the secretariat, as to how they want that mandate executed on IP and development." He noted that members had affirmed the validity of development concerns relating to IP and had recognised that WIPO needed strategies to address what he termed "an emerging area."

Goodwin also praised the efforts made by developed and developing country members alike, in their preparation and willingness to engage both before and during the official sessions. Informal meetings in Delhi in February and Singapore earlier this month had "focussed people and helped to get ideas in order ahead of time." The tenor of exchanges between the Friends of Development and the Group B industrialised countries had improved markedly. "Trust was an ingredient in the success of the PCDA that had perhaps been lacking before," he said.

Immediately after the accord, members got an early indication of the difficult work ahead for WIPO and its new Committee on IP and Development. In particular, the US renewed its calls for "ambitious plans for substantive patent law harmonisation," progress on which has been linked to the development agenda negotiations. Developing countries have generally been wary of attempts to harmonise patent rules.

ICTSD reporting; "WIPO Committee Reaches Breakthrough Agreements On Development Agenda," INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY WATCH, 15 June 2007.