Agreement at the UN for an international treaty against biopiracy

More than 190 countries agreed on Friday to a “historic” patent treaty to fight so-called biopiracythe exploitation of genetic resources and traditional knowledge of indigenous peoples, which had been negotiated for more than 20 years.

After almost two weeks of discussions, the States “approved a new treated “an innovative process relating to intellectual property, genetic resources and associated traditional knowledge, thus achieving a historic advance that culminates decades of negotiations,” said the HIM it’s a statement.

He treated will force patent applicants to disclose the origin of their genetic resources and the traditional knowledge used in their invention.

The goal is to fight biopiracy and ensure that an invention is truly innovative and that potentially affected countries and local communities have agreed to use their genetic resources, such as plant species, and traditional knowledge.

The member countries of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), an agency of the HIM had been meeting since May 13 in the Swiss city of Geneva to conclude more than two decades of negotiations.

“We have been waiting for this moment for 25 years,” declared the president of the negotiations, Brazilian ambassador Guilherme de Aguiar Patriota, after validating the approval by consensus on treated.

Is the first treated of WIPO on intellectual property, genetic resources and traditional knowledge, and also the first to include specific provisions for indigenous peoples and local communities, this WIPO agency stressed. HIM.

“We demonstrate that the intellectual property system can continue to incentivize innovation while evolving more inclusively, responding to the needs of all countries and their communities,” said WIPO Director General Daren Tang.

“Today we have entered history in many ways,” he added.

“Just balance”

“We welcome the result, which strikes a fair balance between promoting innovation and improving the transparency of the patent system,” reacted the Dutch representative, speaking on behalf of several Western countries.

The agreement was not won in advance: “We had some ups and downs,” he said.

The transparency that implies treated It must reinforce the implementation of the Nagoya protocol, which provides that people who provide genetic resources and traditional knowledge enjoy benefits, not necessarily monetary, for their use.

“I wouldn’t go so far as to say that (the treated) is revolutionary,” Antony Scott Taubman, who in 2001 created the traditional knowledge division at WIPO, told AFP.

But it allows us to stipulate that a patent request implies that the plaintiff has “responsibilities” and that “it is not a purely technical procedure,” he clarified.

Genetic resources such as microorganisms, animal and plant species or genetic sequences are increasingly used in numerous inventions, such as seeds and medicines that have allowed considerable advances in health, climate or food security, according to the HIM.

More than thirty countries already require disclosure of this information. They are mostly developing countries such as China, Brazil, India or South Africa, but also European countries such as France, Germany and Switzerland.

But the rules vary depending on the country and are not always mandatory.

Two years ago, the countries decided to convene a conference with the aim of concluding an agreement by 2024 at the latest.

Only the United States and Japan “officially disassociated themselves from the decision,” although without opposing the consensus.