A month is too long in geopolitics. As trade diplomats resumed discussions this month on the TRIPS waiver proposal after a month long break in August, they returned to changing contours of these discussions. At the face of it, not much has changed namely that the key opponents including the EU, Switzerland and the UK, have continued to dig into their heels, resisting the approach to temporarily waiving intellectual property protections for COVID-19 medical products. In the meantime, the co-sponsors were joined by more WTO members including Jordan and Malaysia. Australia and China have also said that they will support the … Continue reading TRIPS Waiver opponents ring-fenced by growing support for proposal

Calling the crucial discussions on the TRIPS Waiver as a “stalemate”, the European Union this week, urged the WTO membership gathered for the General Council meeting, to consider its “pragmatic”, albeit, watered down proposal on the IP response to the pandemic instead of the TRIPS waiver proposal, a far more comprehensive approach to address IP barriers in the context of COVID-19. The EU proposal mostly focuses on the use of compulsory licensing, while South Africa-India’s proposal seeks a temporary suspension on rules across a range of intellectual property protections from patents, copyright, to trade secrets among others in order to … Continue reading The Writing on the Wall? The EU Seeks to Steer Talks Away from the TRIPS Waiver Proposal

THE GENEVA HEALTH FILES INTERVIEW “Only a multi-pronged approach will bring about real change” Q&A: João Aguiar Machado, EU Ambassador to the WTO As WTO members continue to negotiate on ways to streamline, adapt intellectual property rules in the response to the pandemic, we bring you this timely interview with EU’s ambassador to the WTO, João Aguiar Machado. He discusses the different strands in the EU’s overall strategy on trade and health at the WTO in the context of this health emergency. Later this week, members head to an informal TRIPS Council meeting on 30 June to discuss South Africa-India’s … Continue reading TRIPS Talks: Interview with João Aguiar Machado, EU Ambassador to the WTO

Why the scope of the TRIPS Waiver is crucial to address the pandemic? Tough start to the negotiations on the TRIPS Waiver. Countries remain divided, but agree to engage. The U.S. does not commit to a deadline to reach decision on TRIPS Waiver talks In today’s update on the TRIPS Waiver talks, we look at the informal meeting among WTO members on June 17 where countries agreed on a roadmap for the negotiations. We also look at the substantive elements in the revised proposal and the procedural aspects to this discussion. For this story, we had extensive interviews with diplomatic sources … Continue reading The importance of the scope of the TRIPS Waiver. Talks off to a tough start at WTO

After months of pushing for a blanket, time-bound, waiver on intellectual property protections to effectively address the pandemic, South Africa and India joined by more than 60 co-sponsors of the TRIPS Waiver proposal, finally managed to get the WTO membership to agree to talk text. Members will convene at an informal meeting on 17 June to assess how they can move forward ahead of General Council meeting in July. Notably, UK, Switzerland, EU, Korea, remain opposed to the waiver proposal. As many as 48 delegations took the floor this week, during the TRIPS Council formal meeting. Image credit: Photo by Sandeep Ket from Pexels To read … Continue reading Stage set for TRIPS Talks: An intense summer of negotiations for Geneva