Original news and analysis on international IP policy
BERLIN -- The future of the European intellectual property enforcement framework is under heavy discussion at the second IP Enforcement Summit of the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) in Berlin today.
An event held on the side of the World Intellectual Property Organization committee on traditional knowledge meeting last week looked at ways to move discussions forward in the light of the committee’s expected renewed mandate. Speakers explored different perspectives and possible new avenues for indigenous and local communities to protect and manage their knowledge and cultural heritage, without the threat of misappropriation.
Inspiring, generous, humanist, nobody was short of praise and anecdotes at an event last week to celebrate the lifelong contribution of Pedro Roffe, well-known Geneva thinker and writer on intellectual property. A conference on the evolution of intellectual property, trade and development had been organised for the occasion, congregating many IP experts offering their perspective on the role of IP in fields, such as public health, innovation policy, and competition law.
Open access is “part of the DNA” of international intergovernmental organisations, Charlotte Beauchamp, head of editorial and design at the World Intellectual Property Organization, said during a workshop last week. Representatives of different international organisations described during the workshop the increasing use of an open access policy by their organisations.
A recommendation to continue the work of the World Intellectual Property Organization committee on the protection of traditional knowledge, genetic resources and folklore is on its way to the organisation's annual General Assembly in October. However, the details of the mandate are left for the General Assembly to discuss, such as the mandate and the work programme of the committee for the next two years.
Delegations this week agreed on a revised set of draft articles aiming to protect traditional cultural expressions (folklore) from misappropriation, typically for commercial interests. However, several proposals made by the United States, some of which were supported by the European Union, were seen by others as defying the purpose of the potential treaty.
The World Health Organization announced yesterday that it has begun work on a list of essential diagnostics, as an echo of its Model List of Essential Medicines.
Different representatives of indigenous people shared their views and concerns on the protection of the rights of indigenous people and local communities during a side event at the World Intellectual Property Organization this week. Speakers underlined the need of consultation of indigenous people during negotiations about their rights.
"Political and economic pressure placed on governments to forgo the use of TRIPS flexibilities violates the integrity and legitimacy of the system of legal duties and rights created by the TRIPS agreement and as reaffirmed by the Doha Declaration," India told a World Trade Organization committee this week, referring to the WTO Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS).
Switzerland, Sweden, the Netherlands, the United States and the United Kingdom are the top five global innovative economies, according to the Global Innovation Index 2017, released today.
The Unified Patent Court (UPC) in Europe was previously expected to open for business in December 2017 but that timeline has now slipped.
There is “no question” that there is a link between the infrastructure of the internet and human rights, Nicolas Seidler, senior policy advisor at the Internet Society, said at an information society event this week. Human rights are becoming “increasingly part of the design of the internet,” Niels ten Oever, head of digital at ARTICLE 19, said at the same event.