[A2k] IP-Watch: Negotiators Agree To Add Access To Knowledge To WIPO Mandate

[Thiru Balasubramaniam]

http://ip-watch.org/weblog/wp-trackback.php?p=3D654

14 June 2007
Negotiators Agree To Add Access To Knowledge To WIPO Mandate

By Tove Iren S. Gerhardsen

World Intellectual Property Organization members negotiating
development-related proposals for WIPO=92s future mandate reached
preliminary agreement on several more key issues Thursday, including
access to knowledge and exceptions and limitations.

Agreement came after lengthy talks on what officials described as the
most difficult area of the negotiations, which are expected to end on
Friday. There were still four clusters of proposals left to be
addressed with two days remaining in the 11-15 June meeting of the
Permanent Committee on Proposals for a WIPO Development Agenda (PCDA).

A first set of proposals were agreed earlier in the week (IPW, WIPO, 14
June 2007). A new draft emerging on 14 June showed that compromises had
been reached on more points that had previously seemed intractable,
leading some sources to commend the positive spirit at the meeting.

Discussions in the small sequestered negotiating group with reportedly
hard-driving PCDA Chair Trevor Clarke, the Barbados ambassador,
continued in an attempt to conclude all the clusters by the end of the
meeting and send recommendations to the September General Assembly.

One of the main disagreements from 13 June in the cluster entitled
=93Norm-setting, flexibilities, public policy and public domain=94 was a
paragraph related to access to knowledge, which Group B first opposed.
It now reads: =93To initiate discussions on how, within WIPO=92s mandate,
to further facilitate access to knowledge and technology for developing
countries and LDCs [least developed countries] to foster creativity and
innovation and to strengthen such existing activities within WIPO.=94

One developing country official told Intellectual Property Watch that
the Group B of developing countries had added the =93within WIPO=92s
mandate=94 and the word =93further=94 had also been added to reach agreemen=
t.
The original proposal from 13 June said, =93to discuss possible new
initiatives and strengthen existing mechanism within WIPO.=94

Agreement was also reached on the public domain issue, which now starts
with: =93To promote norm-setting activities related to IP that support a
robust public domain in WIPO=92s member states.=94

Other issues in this cluster are a requirement to hold consultations
with nongovernmental organisations, and that =93norm-setting activities
should be supportive of the development goals agreed within the UN
system.=94 It also was agreed that WIPO should address issues such as
=93safeguarding national implementation of intellectual property rules",
=93potential flexibilities, exceptions and limitations for member
states", =93IP-related transfer of technology", and possibly add special
provisions for smaller economies, all in its working documents for
norm-setting activities. And finally, on licensing it was agreed:

=93To consider how to better promote pro-competitive IP licensing
practices, particularly with a view to fostering creativity, innovation
and the transfer and dissemination of technology to interested
countries, in particular developing countries and LDCs.=94

Four issues that were added to this cluster at the meeting are no
longer in this cluster, with one on flexibilities related to
international trade law having been withdrawn, one official said.

A proposal on exchanging experiences on open collaborative projects for
the development of public goods such as the Human Genome Project and
open source software was moved to another cluster, together with a
proposal related to counterfeiting and piracy and one on best practices
for economic growth, sources said. At presstime, these issues were
being heatedly debated, according to sources.

Tove Gerhardsen may be reached at tgerhardsen@ip-watch.ch.


---------------------------------
Thiru Balasubramaniam
Geneva Representative
Knowledge Ecology International (KEI)
voice +41.22.791.6727
fax +41.22.723.2988
mobile +41 76 508 0997
thiru@keionline.org