Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights
Encyclopedia
The Agreement on Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) is an international agreement administered by the World Trade Organization
(WTO) that sets down minimum standards for many forms of intellectual property
(IP) regulation as applied to nationals of other WTO Members. It was negotiated at the end of the Uruguay Round
of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade
(GATT) in 1994.
The TRIPS agreement introduced intellectual property law into the international trading system for the first time and remains the most comprehensive international agreement on intellectual property to date. In 2001, developing countries, concerned that developed countries were insisting on an overly narrow reading of TRIPS, initiated a round of talks that resulted in the Doha Declaration
. The Doha declaration is a WTO statement that clarifies the scope of TRIPS, stating for example that TRIPS can and should be interpreted in light of the goal "to promote access to medicines for all."
Specifically, TRIPS contains requirements that nations' laws must meet for copyright
rights, including the rights of performers, producers of sound recordings and broadcasting organizations; geographical indication
s, including appellations of origin; industrial designs; integrated circuit layout-designs; patent
s; monopolies for the developers of new plant varieties
; trademark
s; trade dress
; and undisclosed or confidential information. TRIPS also specifies enforcement procedures, remedies, and dispute resolution
procedures. Protection and enforcement of all intellectual property rights shall meet the objectives to contribute to the promotion of technological innovation and to the transfer and dissemination of technology, to the mutual advantage of producers and users of technological knowledge and in a manner conducive to social and economic welfare, and to a balance of rights and obligations.
of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade
(GATT) in 1994. Its inclusion was the culmination of a program of intense lobbying
by the United States
, supported by the European Union
, Japan
and other developed nations. Campaigns of unilateral economic encouragement under the Generalized System of Preferences
and coercion under Section 301
of the Trade Act played an important role in defeating competing policy positions that were favored by developing countries, most notably Korea and Brazil, but also including Thailand, India and Caribbean Basin states. In turn, the United States strategy of linking trade policy to intellectual property standards can be traced back to the entrepreneurship of senior management at Pfizer
in the early 1980s, who mobilized corporations in the United States and made maximizing intellectual property privileges the number one priority of trade policy in the United States (Braithwaite and Drahos, 2000, Chapter 7).
After the Uruguay round, the GATT became the basis for the establishment of the World Trade Organization. Because ratification of TRIPS is a compulsory requirement of World Trade Organization membership, any country seeking to obtain easy access to the numerous international markets opened by the World Trade Organization must enact the strict intellectual property laws mandated by TRIPS. For this reason, TRIPS is the most important multilateral instrument for the globalization of intellectual property laws. States like Russia and China that were very unlikely to join the Berne Convention
have found the prospect of WTO membership a powerful enticement.
Furthermore, unlike other agreements on intellectual property, TRIPS has a powerful enforcement mechanism. States can be disciplined through the WTO's dispute settlement
mechanism.
Many of the TRIPS provisions on copyright were copied from the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works
and many of its trademark and patent provisions were modeled on the Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property
.
drugs in Africa. Despite the role that patents have played in maintaining higher drug costs for public health programs across Africa, this controversy has not led to a revision of TRIPs. Instead, an interpretive statement, the Doha Declaration
, was issued in November 2001, which indicated that TRIPs should not prevent states from dealing with public health crises. After Doha, PhRMA, the United States and to a lesser extent other developed nations began working to minimize the effect of the declaration.
A 2003 agreement loosened the domestic market requirement, and allows developing countries to export to other countries where there is a national health problem as long as drugs exported are not part of a commercial or industrial policy. Drugs exported under such a regime may be packaged or colored differently to prevent them from prejudicing markets in the developed world.
In 2003, the Bush administration also changed its position, concluding that generic treatments might in fact be a component of an effective strategy to combat HIV. Bush created the PEPFAR program, which received $15 billion from 2003–2007, and was reauthorized in 2007 for $30 billion over the next five years. Despite wavering on the issue of compulsory licensing, PEPFAR began to distribute generic drugs in 2004-5.
and business method patent
s.
to implement TRIPS was extended to 2013, and until 1 January 2016 for pharmaceutical patents, with the possibility of further extension.
It has therefore been argued that the TRIPS standard of requiring all countries to create strict intellectual property systems will be detrimental to poorer countries' development. Many argue that it is, prima facie, in the strategic interest of most if not all underdeveloped nations to use any flexibility available in TRIPS to legislate the weakest IP laws possible.
This has not happened in most cases. A 2005 report by the WHO
found that many developing countries have not incorporated TRIPS flexibilities (compulsory licensing, parallel importation, limits on data protection, use of broad research and other exceptions to patentability, etc.) into their legislation to the extent authorized under Doha.
This is likely caused by the lack of legal and technical expertise needed to draft legislation that implements flexibilities, which has often led to developing countries directly copying developed country IP legislation, or relying on technical assistance from the World Intellectual Property Organization
(WIPO), which, according to critics such as Cory Doctorow
, encourages them to implement stronger intellectual property monopolies.
The WTO website has a gateway to all TRIPS disputes (including those that did not lead to panel reports) here http://www.wto.int/english/tratop_e/dispu_e/dispu_subjects_index_e.htm#trips.
s. Some of this criticism is against the WTO as a whole, but many advocates of trade liberalization also regard TRIPS as bad policy (see, for example, Jagdish Bhagwati
's In Defense of Globalization for a discussion on the detrimental effect of TRIPS on access to medicines in developing countries). TRIPS' wealth redistribution effects (moving money from people in developing countries to copyright and patent owners in developed countries) and its imposition of artificial scarcity
on the citizens of countries that would otherwise have had weaker intellectual property laws, are a common basis for such criticisms.
Peter Drahos
writes that "It was an accepted part of international commercial morality that states would design domestic intellectual property law to suit their own economic circumstances. States made sure that existing international intellectual property agreements gave them plenty of latitude to do so."
Daniele Archibugi
and Andrea Filippetti argue that the importance of TRIPS in the process of generation and diffusion of knowledge and innovation has been overestimated by both their supporters and their detractors. Claude Henry and Joseph E. Stiglitz
argue that the current intellectual property global regime may impede both innovation and dissemination, and suggest reforms to foster the global dissemination of innovation and sustainable development
.
World Trade Organization
The World Trade Organization is an organization that intends to supervise and liberalize international trade. The organization officially commenced on January 1, 1995 under the Marrakech Agreement, replacing the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade , which commenced in 1948...
(WTO) that sets down minimum standards for many forms of intellectual property
Intellectual property
Intellectual property is a term referring to a number of distinct types of creations of the mind for which a set of exclusive rights are recognized—and the corresponding fields of law...
(IP) regulation as applied to nationals of other WTO Members. It was negotiated at the end of the Uruguay Round
Uruguay Round
The Uruguay Round was the 8th round of Multilateral trade negotiations conducted within the framework of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade , spanning from 1986-1994 and embracing 123 countries as “contracting parties”. The Round transformed the GATT into the World Trade Organization...
of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade
General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade
The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade was negotiated during the UN Conference on Trade and Employment and was the outcome of the failure of negotiating governments to create the International Trade Organization . GATT was signed in 1947 and lasted until 1993, when it was replaced by the World...
(GATT) in 1994.
The TRIPS agreement introduced intellectual property law into the international trading system for the first time and remains the most comprehensive international agreement on intellectual property to date. In 2001, developing countries, concerned that developed countries were insisting on an overly narrow reading of TRIPS, initiated a round of talks that resulted in the Doha Declaration
Doha Declaration
The November 2001 Doha Declaration on the TRIPS Agreement and Public Health was adopted by the WTO Ministerial Conference of 2001 in Doha on November 14, 2001...
. The Doha declaration is a WTO statement that clarifies the scope of TRIPS, stating for example that TRIPS can and should be interpreted in light of the goal "to promote access to medicines for all."
Specifically, TRIPS contains requirements that nations' laws must meet for copyright
Copyright
Copyright is a legal concept, enacted by most governments, giving the creator of an original work exclusive rights to it, usually for a limited time...
rights, including the rights of performers, producers of sound recordings and broadcasting organizations; geographical indication
Geographical indication
A geographical indication is a name or sign used on certain products which corresponds to a specific geographical location or origin...
s, including appellations of origin; industrial designs; integrated circuit layout-designs; patent
Patent
A patent is a form of intellectual property. It consists of a set of exclusive rights granted by a sovereign state to an inventor or their assignee for a limited period of time in exchange for the public disclosure of an invention....
s; monopolies for the developers of new plant varieties
Plant breeders' rights
Plant breeders' rights , also known as plant variety rights , are rights granted to the breeder of a new variety of plant that give him exclusive control over the propagating material and harvested material of a new variety for a number of years.With these rights, the breeder can choose...
; trademark
Trademark
A trademark, trade mark, or trade-mark is a distinctive sign or indicator used by an individual, business organization, or other legal entity to identify that the products or services to consumers with which the trademark appears originate from a unique source, and to distinguish its products or...
s; trade dress
Trade dress
Trade dress is a legal term of art that generally refers to characteristics of the visual appearance of a product or its packaging that signify the source of the product to consumers...
; and undisclosed or confidential information. TRIPS also specifies enforcement procedures, remedies, and dispute resolution
Dispute resolution
Dispute resolution is the process of resolving disputes between parties.-Methods:Methods of dispute resolution include:* lawsuits * arbitration* collaborative law* mediation* conciliation* many types of negotiation* facilitation...
procedures. Protection and enforcement of all intellectual property rights shall meet the objectives to contribute to the promotion of technological innovation and to the transfer and dissemination of technology, to the mutual advantage of producers and users of technological knowledge and in a manner conducive to social and economic welfare, and to a balance of rights and obligations.
Background and history
TRIPS was negotiated at the end of the Uruguay RoundUruguay Round
The Uruguay Round was the 8th round of Multilateral trade negotiations conducted within the framework of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade , spanning from 1986-1994 and embracing 123 countries as “contracting parties”. The Round transformed the GATT into the World Trade Organization...
of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade
General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade
The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade was negotiated during the UN Conference on Trade and Employment and was the outcome of the failure of negotiating governments to create the International Trade Organization . GATT was signed in 1947 and lasted until 1993, when it was replaced by the World...
(GATT) in 1994. Its inclusion was the culmination of a program of intense lobbying
Lobbying
Lobbying is the act of attempting to influence decisions made by officials in the government, most often legislators or members of regulatory agencies. Lobbying is done by various people or groups, from private-sector individuals or corporations, fellow legislators or government officials, or...
by the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, supported by the European Union
European Union
The European Union is an economic and political union of 27 independent member states which are located primarily in Europe. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Economic Community , formed by six countries in 1958...
, Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
and other developed nations. Campaigns of unilateral economic encouragement under the Generalized System of Preferences
Generalized System of Preferences
The Generalized System of Preferences, or GSP, is a formal system of exemption from the more general rules of the World Trade Organization ,...
and coercion under Section 301
Section 301
Section 301 of the U.S. Trade Act of 1974, authorizes the President to take all appropriate action, including retaliation, to obtain the removal of any act, policy, or practice of a foreign government that violates an international trade agreement or is unjustified, unreasonable, or...
of the Trade Act played an important role in defeating competing policy positions that were favored by developing countries, most notably Korea and Brazil, but also including Thailand, India and Caribbean Basin states. In turn, the United States strategy of linking trade policy to intellectual property standards can be traced back to the entrepreneurship of senior management at Pfizer
Pfizer
Pfizer, Inc. is an American multinational pharmaceutical corporation. The company is based in New York City, New York with its research headquarters in Groton, Connecticut, United States...
in the early 1980s, who mobilized corporations in the United States and made maximizing intellectual property privileges the number one priority of trade policy in the United States (Braithwaite and Drahos, 2000, Chapter 7).
After the Uruguay round, the GATT became the basis for the establishment of the World Trade Organization. Because ratification of TRIPS is a compulsory requirement of World Trade Organization membership, any country seeking to obtain easy access to the numerous international markets opened by the World Trade Organization must enact the strict intellectual property laws mandated by TRIPS. For this reason, TRIPS is the most important multilateral instrument for the globalization of intellectual property laws. States like Russia and China that were very unlikely to join the Berne Convention
Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works
The Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works, usually known as the Berne Convention, is an international agreement governing copyright, which was first accepted in Berne, Switzerland in 1886.- Content :...
have found the prospect of WTO membership a powerful enticement.
Furthermore, unlike other agreements on intellectual property, TRIPS has a powerful enforcement mechanism. States can be disciplined through the WTO's dispute settlement
WTO Dispute Settlement Body
The Dispute Settlement Body of the World Trade Organization makes decisions on trade disputes between governments that are adjudicated by the Organization...
mechanism.
The requirements of TRIPS
TRIPS requires member states to provide strong protection for intellectual property rights. For example, under TRIPS:- Copyright terms must extend to 50 years after the death of the authorAuthorAn author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...
.(Art. 12 and 14)http://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/trips_e/t_agm3_e.htm - Copyright must be granted automatically, and not based upon any "formality," such as registrations or systems of renewal.
- Computer programs must be regarded as "literary works" under copyright law and receive the same terms of protection.
- National exceptions to copyrightLimitations and exceptions to copyrightLimitations and exceptions to copyright are provisions in copyright law which allow for copyrighted works to be used without a license from the copyright owner....
(such as "fair useFair useFair use is a limitation and exception to the exclusive right granted by copyright law to the author of a creative work. In United States copyright law, fair use is a doctrine that permits limited use of copyrighted material without acquiring permission from the rights holders...
" in the United States) are constrained by the Berne three-step testBerne three-step testThe Berne three-step test is a clause that is included in several international treaties on intellectual property. It imposes on signatories to the treaties constraints on the possible limitations and exceptions to exclusive rights under national copyright laws.- Berne Convention :The three-step... - Patents must be granted in all "fields of technology," although exceptions for certain public interests are allowed (Art. 27.2 and 27.3) and must be enforceable for at least 20 years (Art 33).
- Exceptions to exclusive rights must be limited, provided that a normal exploitation of the work (Art. 13) and normal exploitation of the patent (Art 30) is not in conflict.
- No unreasonable prejudice to the legitimate interests of the right holders of computer programs and patents is allowed.
- Legitimate interests of third parties have to be taken into account by patent rights (Art 30).
- In each state, intellectual property laws may not offer any benefits to local citizens which are not available to citizens of other TRIPS signatories under the principle of national treatmentNational treatmentNational treatment is a principle in international law vital to many treaty regimes. It essentially means treating foreigners and locals equally. Under national treatment, if a state grants a particular right, benefit or privilege to its own citizens, it must also grant those advantages to the...
(with certain limited exceptions, Art. 3 and 5). TRIPS also has a most favored nation clause.
Many of the TRIPS provisions on copyright were copied from the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works
Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works
The Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works, usually known as the Berne Convention, is an international agreement governing copyright, which was first accepted in Berne, Switzerland in 1886.- Content :...
and many of its trademark and patent provisions were modeled on the Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property
Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property
The Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property, signed in Paris, France, on March 20, 1883, was one of the first intellectual property treaties. It established a Union for the protection of industrial property...
.
Access to essential medicines
The most visible conflict has been over AIDSAIDS
Acquired immune deficiency syndrome or acquired immunodeficiency syndrome is a disease of the human immune system caused by the human immunodeficiency virus...
drugs in Africa. Despite the role that patents have played in maintaining higher drug costs for public health programs across Africa, this controversy has not led to a revision of TRIPs. Instead, an interpretive statement, the Doha Declaration
Doha Declaration
The November 2001 Doha Declaration on the TRIPS Agreement and Public Health was adopted by the WTO Ministerial Conference of 2001 in Doha on November 14, 2001...
, was issued in November 2001, which indicated that TRIPs should not prevent states from dealing with public health crises. After Doha, PhRMA, the United States and to a lesser extent other developed nations began working to minimize the effect of the declaration.
A 2003 agreement loosened the domestic market requirement, and allows developing countries to export to other countries where there is a national health problem as long as drugs exported are not part of a commercial or industrial policy. Drugs exported under such a regime may be packaged or colored differently to prevent them from prejudicing markets in the developed world.
In 2003, the Bush administration also changed its position, concluding that generic treatments might in fact be a component of an effective strategy to combat HIV. Bush created the PEPFAR program, which received $15 billion from 2003–2007, and was reauthorized in 2007 for $30 billion over the next five years. Despite wavering on the issue of compulsory licensing, PEPFAR began to distribute generic drugs in 2004-5.
Software and business method patents
Another controversy has been over the TRIPS Article 27 requirements for patentability "in all fields of technology", and whether or not this necessitates the granting of softwareSoftware patent
Software patent does not have a universally accepted definition. One definition suggested by the Foundation for a Free Information Infrastructure is that a software patent is a "patent on any performance of a computer realised by means of a computer program".In 2005, the European Patent Office...
and business method patent
Business method patent
Business method patents are a class of patents which disclose and claim new methods of doing business. This includes new types of e-commerce, insurance, banking, tax compliance etc. Business method patents are a relatively new species of patent and there have been several reviews investigating the...
s.
Implementation in developing countries
The obligations under TRIPS apply equally to all member states, however developing countries were allowed extra time to implement the applicable changes to their national laws, in two tiers of transition according to their level of development. The transition period for developing countries expired in 2005. The transition period for least developed countriesLeast Developed Countries
Least developed country is the name given to a country which, according to the United Nations, exhibits the lowest indicators of socioeconomic development, with the lowest Human Development Index ratings of all countries in the world...
to implement TRIPS was extended to 2013, and until 1 January 2016 for pharmaceutical patents, with the possibility of further extension.
It has therefore been argued that the TRIPS standard of requiring all countries to create strict intellectual property systems will be detrimental to poorer countries' development. Many argue that it is, prima facie, in the strategic interest of most if not all underdeveloped nations to use any flexibility available in TRIPS to legislate the weakest IP laws possible.
This has not happened in most cases. A 2005 report by the WHO
Who
Who may refer to:* Who , an English-language pronoun* who , a Unix command* Who?, one of the Five Ws in journalism- Art and entertainment :* Who? , a 1958 novel by Algis Budrys...
found that many developing countries have not incorporated TRIPS flexibilities (compulsory licensing, parallel importation, limits on data protection, use of broad research and other exceptions to patentability, etc.) into their legislation to the extent authorized under Doha.
This is likely caused by the lack of legal and technical expertise needed to draft legislation that implements flexibilities, which has often led to developing countries directly copying developed country IP legislation, or relying on technical assistance from the World Intellectual Property Organization
World Intellectual Property Organization
The World Intellectual Property Organization is one of the 17 specialized agencies of the United Nations. WIPO was created in 1967 "to encourage creative activity, to promote the protection of intellectual property throughout the world"....
(WIPO), which, according to critics such as Cory Doctorow
Cory Doctorow
Cory Efram Doctorow is a Canadian-British blogger, journalist, and science fiction author who serves as co-editor of the blog Boing Boing. He is an activist in favour of liberalising copyright laws and a proponent of the Creative Commons organization, using some of their licences for his books...
, encourages them to implement stronger intellectual property monopolies.
Post-TRIPS expansion
The requirements of TRIPS are, from a policy perspective, extremely stringent. Despite this, lobbyists for the industries that benefit from various intellectual property laws have continued since 1994 to campaign to strengthen existing forms of intellectual property and to create new kinds:- The creation of anti-circumvention laws to protect Digital Rights ManagementDigital rights managementDigital rights management is a class of access control technologies that are used by hardware manufacturers, publishers, copyright holders and individuals with the intent to limit the use of digital content and devices after sale. DRM is any technology that inhibits uses of digital content that...
systems. This was achieved through the 1996 World Intellectual Property Organization Copyright TreatyWorld Intellectual Property Organization Copyright TreatyThe World Intellectual Property Organization Copyright Treaty, abbreviated as the WIPO Copyright Treaty, is an international treaty on copyright law adopted by the member states of the World Intellectual Property Organization in 1996...
(WIPO Treaty) and the WIPO Performances and Phonograms TreatyWIPO Performances and Phonograms TreatyThe WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty is an international treaty signed by the member states of the World Intellectual Property Organization was adopted in Geneva on December 20, 1996...
. - The desire to further restrict the possibility of compulsory licenseCompulsory licenseA compulsory license, also known as statutory license or mandatory collective management, provides that the owner of a patent or copyright licenses the use of their rights against payment either set by law or determined through some form of arbitration.- Copyright law :In a number of countries...
s for patents has led to provisions in recent bilateral US trade agreements. - It is one thing for states to have intellectual property laws on their statutes, and another for governments to enforce them aggressively. This distinction has led to provisions in bilateral agreements, as well as proposals for WIPO and European UnionEuropean UnionThe European Union is an economic and political union of 27 independent member states which are located primarily in Europe. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Economic Community , formed by six countries in 1958...
rules on intellectual property enforcement. The 2001 EU Copyright Directive was to implement the 1996 WIPO Copyright Treaty. - The wording of Trips 27 of non-discrimination is used to justify an extension of the patent system.
- The campaign for the creation of a WIPO Broadcasting Treaty that would give broadcasters (and possibly webcasters) exclusive rights over the copies of works they have distributed.
Panel reports
According to WTO 10th Anniversary, Highlights of the first decade, Annual Report 2005 page 142, in the first ten years, 25 complaints have been lodged leading to the panel reports and appellate body reports on TRIPS listed below.The WTO website has a gateway to all TRIPS disputes (including those that did not lead to panel reports) here http://www.wto.int/english/tratop_e/dispu_e/dispu_subjects_index_e.htm#trips.
- 2005 Panel Report http://www.wto.org/english/news_e/news05_e/panelreport_174_290_e.htm:
- European CommunitiesEuropean CommunitiesThe European Communities were three international organisations that were governed by the same set of institutions...
- Protection of TrademarkTrademarkA trademark, trade mark, or trade-mark is a distinctive sign or indicator used by an individual, business organization, or other legal entity to identify that the products or services to consumers with which the trademark appears originate from a unique source, and to distinguish its products or...
s and Geographical IndicationGeographical indicationA geographical indication is a name or sign used on certain products which corresponds to a specific geographical location or origin...
s for Agricultural Products and Foodstuffs.
- European Communities
- 2000 Panel Report http://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/dispu_e/1391da.pdf, Part 2 http://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/dispu_e/1391db.pdf and 2000 Appellate Body Report http://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/dispu_e/170abr_e.pdf:
- CanadaCanadaCanada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
- Term of Patent Protection.
- Canada
- 2000 Panel Report, Part 1 http://www.wto.org/english/news_e/news00_e/1234da.pdf and Part 2 http://www.wto.org/english/news_e/news00_e/1234db.pdf:
- United StatesUnited StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
- Section 110(5) of the US Copyright ActUnited States copyright lawThe copyright law of the United States governs the legally enforceable rights of creative and artistic works under the laws of the United States.Copyright law in the United States is part of federal law, and is authorized by the U.S. Constitution...
.
- United States
- 2000 Panel Report http://www.worldtradelaw.net/reports/wtopanelsfull/canada-pharmaceuticals(panel)(full).pdf:
- Canada - Patent Protection of Pharmaceutical Products.
- 2001 Panel Report http://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/dispu_e/176r_e.pdf and 2002 Appellate Body Report http://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/dispu_e/176abr_e.pdf:
- United States - Section 211 Omnibus Appropriations Act of 1998.
- 1998 Panel Report http://www.worldtradelaw.net/reports/wtopanelsfull/india-patents(panel)(ec)(full).pdf:
- IndiaIndiaIndia , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
- Patent Protection for Pharmaceutical and Agricultural Chemical Products.
- India
- 1998 Panel Report http://www.worldtradelaw.net/reports/wtopanelsfull/indonesia-autos(panel)(full).pdf:
- IndonesiaIndonesiaIndonesia , officially the Republic of Indonesia , is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania. Indonesia is an archipelago comprising approximately 13,000 islands. It has 33 provinces with over 238 million people, and is the world's fourth most populous country. Indonesia is a republic, with an...
- Certain Measures Affecting the Automobile Industry.
- Indonesia
Criticism
Since TRIPS came into force it has received a growing level of criticism from developing countries, academics, and Non-governmental organizationNon-governmental organization
A non-governmental organization is a legally constituted organization created by natural or legal persons that operates independently from any government. The term originated from the United Nations , and is normally used to refer to organizations that do not form part of the government and are...
s. Some of this criticism is against the WTO as a whole, but many advocates of trade liberalization also regard TRIPS as bad policy (see, for example, Jagdish Bhagwati
Jagdish Bhagwati
Jagdish Natwarlal Bhagwati is an Indian-American economist and professor of economics and law at Columbia University. He is well known for his research in international trade and for his advocacy of free trade....
's In Defense of Globalization for a discussion on the detrimental effect of TRIPS on access to medicines in developing countries). TRIPS' wealth redistribution effects (moving money from people in developing countries to copyright and patent owners in developed countries) and its imposition of artificial scarcity
Artificial scarcity
Artificial scarcity describes the scarcity of items even though the technology and production capacity exists to create an abundance. The term is aptly applied to non-rival resources, i.e. those that do not diminish due to one person's use, although there are other resources which could be...
on the citizens of countries that would otherwise have had weaker intellectual property laws, are a common basis for such criticisms.
Peter Drahos
Peter Drahos
Professor Peter Drahos is an Australian academic and researcher specializing in the areas of intellectual property and global business regulation amongst others. He is the Director of the Centre for Governance of Knowledge and Development and the Head of Program of the Regulatory Institutions...
writes that "It was an accepted part of international commercial morality that states would design domestic intellectual property law to suit their own economic circumstances. States made sure that existing international intellectual property agreements gave them plenty of latitude to do so."
Daniele Archibugi
Daniele Archibugi
Daniele Archibugi is an Italian economic and political theorist. He works on the economics and policy of innovation and technological change, on the political theory of international relations and on political and technological globalisation....
and Andrea Filippetti argue that the importance of TRIPS in the process of generation and diffusion of knowledge and innovation has been overestimated by both their supporters and their detractors. Claude Henry and Joseph E. Stiglitz
Joseph E. Stiglitz
Joseph Eugene Stiglitz, ForMemRS, FBA, is an American economist and a professor at Columbia University. He is a recipient of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences and the John Bates Clark Medal . He is also the former Senior Vice President and Chief Economist of the World Bank...
argue that the current intellectual property global regime may impede both innovation and dissemination, and suggest reforms to foster the global dissemination of innovation and sustainable development
Sustainable development
Sustainable development is a pattern of resource use, that aims to meet human needs while preserving the environment so that these needs can be met not only in the present, but also for generations to come...
.
Related treaties and laws
- Anti-Counterfeiting Trade AgreementAnti-Counterfeiting Trade AgreementThe Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement is a proposed plurilateral agreement for the purpose of establishing international standards on intellectual property rights enforcement...
(ACTA) - EU Directive on the enforcement of intellectual property rightsDirective on the enforcement of intellectual property rightsDirective 2004/48/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 29 April 2004 on the enforcement of intellectual property rights is a European Union directive in the field of intellectual property law, made under the internal market provisions of the Treaty of Rome...
(IPRED) - Patent Law TreatyPatent Law TreatyThe Patent Law Treaty is a patent law multilateral treaty concluded on 1 June 2000 in Geneva, Switzerland, by 53 States and the European Patent Organisation...
(PLT) - Substantive Patent Law TreatySubstantive Patent Law TreatyThe Substantive Patent Law Treaty is a proposed international patent law treaty aimed at harmonizing substantive points of patent law. In contrast with the Patent Law Treaty , signed in 2000 and now in force, which only relates to formalities, the SPLT aims at going far beyond formalities to...
(SPLT) - Uruguay Round Agreement Act of the United States (URAA)
Related topics
- Confusing similarityConfusing similarityIn trademark law, confusing similarity is a test used during the examination process to determine whether a trademark conflicts with another, earlier mark, and also in trademark infringement proceedings to determine whether the use of a mark infringes a registered trade mark.In many jurisdictions...
- Geographical IndicationGeographical indicationA geographical indication is a name or sign used on certain products which corresponds to a specific geographical location or origin...
- Intellectual property in the People's Republic of ChinaIntellectual property in the People's Republic of ChinaIntellectual property rights have been acknowledged and protected in the People's Republic of China since 1979. The People's Republic of China has acceded to the major international conventions on protection of IPRs...
- List of international trade topics
- List of parties to international copyright agreements
- World Trade Organization Dispute 160World Trade Organization Dispute 160On January 26, 1999, the European Communities and its Member States requested consultation with the United States concerning a dispute over discrepancies between the WTO Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights and Section 110 of the United States Copyright Act amended...
External links
- TRIPS agreement (PDF version)
- Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (html version)
- World Trade Organization links
- Audio presentation by Professor Susan Sell, George Washington University, on intellectual property rights in the global context.