The WIPO Diplomatic Conference on Intellectual Property, Genetic Resources, and Traditional Knowledge, Gets off to a Start in Geneva [GUEST ESSAY]

Newsletter Edition #216 [The Files In-Depth]

Hi,

I am delighted to bring you an update from the ongoing WIPO Diplomatic Conference on Intellectual Property, Genetic Resources, and Traditional Knowledge (DipCon GRTK, for those in the club).

In this edition, we bring you a guest essay on the importance of these deliberations. The author Sreenath Namboodiri, a legal researcher, also presents the historical context of these discussions. We hope you find this valuable. We will be following up subsequently on the outcome of these negotiations, that are expected to conclude later this week.

We are tracking these negotiations at WIPO, as this will move other pieces elsewhere including on, not only the access to medical products, but also on issues of Access and Benefits Sharing, disclosure and transparency requirements, among other areas.

On WHO, you absolutely cannot afford to miss this brief but important story that we published on Sunday - a report on the meeting of the Working Group to amend the IHR.

Close, But Not Yet: Consensus Pending on the Amendments to the International Health Regulations

I am (nearly) camping at WHO this week, as negotiators make the final sprint to see how far they can take the negotiations to arrive at a consensus towards a new Pandemic Agreement. Watch out for our updates on this.

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Until later.

Best,

Priti

Feel free to write to us: patnaik.reporting@gmail.com. Follow us on X: @filesgeneva

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Illustration Credit: Amy Clarke, Chembe Collaborative

I. GUEST ESSAY: WIPO DIPCON GRTK

The WIPO Diplomatic Conference on Intellectual Property, Genetic Resources, and Traditional Knowledge Gets off to a Start in Geneva

By Sreenath Namboodiri

Namboodiri is an independent legal researcher focusing on Intellectual Property and its intersection with Human Rights, based in India.

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Member states  of the World Intellectual Property Organization are negotiating a potential new multilateral treaty that, if adopted by 15 member states, will, for the first time,  create an international mandate to disclose the origins of genetic resources and the use of traditional knowledge in any invention that applies for a patent.

The diplomatic conference to conclude an international legal instrument relating to Intellectual Property, Genetic Resources and Traditional Knowledge associated with Genetic Resources (IGC) is being convened at the Geneva headquarters of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) from May 13 to 24, 2024. This conference marks the culmination of over two decades of work by the Intergovernmental Committee on Intellectual Property and Genetic Resources, Traditional Knowledge and Folklore (IGC), established in 2000 as a result of the Colombian proposal reflecting the longstanding demand of developing countries for acknowledgment of the use of their genetic resources (GR) and traditional knowledge (TK). The negotiations aim to conclude a multilateral international treaty, attended by negotiators from 193 WIPO member states and observers from various stakeholder groups, such as indigenous communities, civil society organizations, intergovernmental organizations, and industry representatives.

The treaty is being negotiated based on the "Basic Proposal," formulated from a draft from 2019 that was put forth by Ian Goss, the then chair of IGC, and a senior IP expert from Australia. This draft text, also known as the ‘Chair’s text’, was the result of years of negotiations and the inability of the member states to find a consensus. And then chair Ian Goss took it upon himself to draft a clean text that aimed to bridge the gap between the two camps on the issue. While developing countries pushed for including the TK and GR disclosure, developed countries were questioning the propriety of discussing a biodiversity issue in the forum of intellectual property rights. However, this grouping of developing and developed is not entirely strict in this case, as there are developed countries such as Switzerland and France in the camp of pro-disclosure. (The Chair’s text was based on years of discussions that followed the Colombian proposal).     

The proposal on the table, being considered by IP negotiators in Geneva this week, carries two major elements. First, it seeks a disclosure requirement to state the origin of genetic resources and/or the local or indigenous community that has shared the traditional knowledge relevant to the genetic resource, which is materially/directly relevant  to a patented invention.  Second, it seeks to establish voluntary information systems, which will be a database of genetic resources and associated traditional knowledge accessible to IP offices for search and examination. Other significant provisions being negotiated include exceptions and limitations, provisions of exclusion of retroactivity, and the relationship of the treaty with other international treaties. Notably, the treaty does not really introduce any substantial change to the international patent system.

Image Credit: Photo by Tom Fisk, Pexels