Original news and analysis on international IP policy
The annual World Health Assembly being held this week has a rare chance to achieve a breakthrough on health research for the global poor if it can agree to move forward on a proposed convention, proponents said at a recent meeting.
The escalating battle between Big Pharma and India’s generic drug manufacturers is pushing down medicine prices in one of the world’s fastest growing pharmaceutical markets.
On the eve of the World Health Assembly, the permanent mission of Brazil organised an informal meeting on sanitary regulation and how to improve cooperation among drug regulatory agencies. Major stakeholders were invited to present challenges and ongoing efforts to improve global quality, safety and efficacy of medical products.
International standards can help economic, societal and environmental issues, Rob Steele, secretary general of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), told a press briefing this week. The organisation also has interests in intellectual property protection.
The tiny island state of Singapore has begun to ramp up its capacity for patent search and examination ahead of a bold move to adopt a new patent system, one of the proposed major amendments to its Patents Act. The Southeast Asian economic high-flyer is pressing for changes to its laws to position itself as an Asian hub for intellectual property.
After the thirteenth quadrennial session of the United Nations body focusing on trade and development, which was to set its mandate for the next four years, delegates reached consensus and avoided major pitfalls, according to several developed and developing country sources. The governments also worked out differences on UNCTAD’s mandate for work on intellectual property rights.
The World Trade Organization this week celebrated 15 years of a tariff-cutting agreement on information technology products, and issued a publication charting the history of the agreement. Industry representatives invited to a symposium joined voices asking that the agreement be expanded, while some called for strategies to incorporate development into technology trade promotion. And a link was made between the agreement and a rise in patents on technology.
The information and communications technology (ICT) for development community is meeting in Geneva this week for a series of conferences on the 2003-2005 World Summit on the Information Society. Government stakeholders, civil society, and the private sector will evaluate progress towards meeting the goals set at the last WSIS in Tunis in 2005 and establish new common goals looking beyond 2015.
In what could be compared to an obstacle course, World Intellectual Property Organization members agreed late at night yesterday on the future work of a committee working on the development dimension of the organisation's activities.
With the launch of a new report concerning research and development for diseases predominately afflicting developing countries, the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers & Associations (IFPMA) today convened a panel of public health specialists to discuss the findings.
A World Intellectual Property Organization committee meeting this week to assess the development dimension of WIPO activities heard the progress report of the director general. Developing countries took the opportunity to claim that the mandate of the committee was not completed, in particular because the development dimension was kept out of two important WIPO bodies.
As World Intellectual Property Organization members engage this week in discussions about the extent of change to the UN agency’s development orientation, a new substantive proposal for reform has been put forward based on an external review of WIPO technical assistance.