[Pharm-policy] Kenya patent review

[James Love]

http://allafrica.com/stories/200010230226.html

Experts Seek To Review Legislation On Patent
System

African Church Information Service
(Nairobi)
October 23, 2000 

Eric Ombok
Nairobi 

Gichinga Ndirangu of Action AID Kenya AAK says that 97 percent of
the patents granted in Kenya by the Kenya Industrial Property Office
KIPO are held by the Developed World.

He adds that the patent system in the Third World is favours the
Developed World. The situation is worsened by the fact that during the
last World Trade Organisation WTO meeting focussed on intellectual
property rights and required world states to put in place modern
legislation towards this end.

So far, 43 countries are yet to do so, Kenya included. On May 4 this
year, however, Kenya's Attorney General, Amos Wako, published the
Parliament before the end of October.

Ndirangu says that a similar Bill had been published by the
government in 1999. The Bill had reached the committee stage of
Parliament when the August house went on recess. The Bill therefore
lapsed and according to the standing orders of the Kenyan parliament,
it had to be introduced afresh.

Of particular concern to the civil society, says Ndirangu, is the
protection of agricultural and pharmaceutical products and their
manufacturing processes. Equally crucial is indigenous knowledge
which he says "should be protected as a sub set within the intellectual
property rights".

A law lecturer at the University of Nairobi, Dr Otieno Odek, refers to
indigenous knowledge as information that is communally possessed
by a people. He adds that usually it has been passed on from one
generation to another.

The Bill seeks to extend the protection period to 20 years with no
provision for renewal... Indeed the Third World has borne the brunt of
intellectual property rights exploitation.

Odek defines intellectual property as "creations of the human intellect.
Results of human creativity". He adds that some are industrial - have
industrial application -while others fall under the copyright law. It is
only
the former which can be patented.

A patent grants the inventor of a product protection from exploitation
by the product's users. Much like the copyright law which is inherent in
the arts and compels users to seek permission and acknowledge the
inventor-authors and musicians for instance.

Kenya has a Copyright Act, Trademarks Act (1957) which was
adopted from British jurisprudence and the Industrial Property Act
1989).

The latter which is due to be amended by the Industrial Property Bill
(2000) grants inventors a patent for seven years from the date of filing
the application. It further has a 10-year renewal period.

The Bill seeks to extend the protection period to 20 years with no
provision for renewal. Indeed the Third World has borne the brunt of
intellectual property rights exploitation.

  [snip]
   

In spite of having such a law in Kenya, the situation on the ground
contradicts the theoretical ideals. Odek says that in spite of having
over 50 years of a patenting system in Kenya (since 1957) innovation
and transfer of technology has not improved while FDI has declined
sharply over the years as inventors are exploited.

"Protection by itself does not spur creativity," he says. He adds that
the national budget of Kenya allocates a mere 0.1 percent to research
and development.

KIPO which came into being in February 1990 through an Act of
Parliament is due to be strengthened by the new Bill.

Stella Munyi of KIPO says the Act was hastily drafted after the Kenya
Medical Research Institute KEMRI discovered, KEMRON, a drug said
to have curative value in managing AIDS.

The new Bill further intends to change KIPO's name to Kenya Industrial
Property Institute (KIPI) and give it more mandate.

Dr James Karuga, Chairman of the Institute of Economic Affairs IEA
has challenged the Bill. He maintains that it shall reinforce Multi
National Corporations MNCs stranglehold on the patent system.

Dr John Mugabe, the Director of African Centre of Technology Studies
ACTS in Nairobi wonders whether the Bill seeks to protect innovation
or monopoly held by MNCs over products, some of which they are not
original inventors.

Similarly the new Bill fails to consolidate and harmonise various Acts
on intellectual Property into one law.