scholarly journals Evaluation of Rights Related to Public Health and Pharmaceutical Patents and Existing Conflicts According to National and International Laws

2020 ◽  
Vol 24 (3) ◽  
pp. 258-269
Author(s):  
Somayeh Rahmani ◽  
◽  
Amir Mahdi Ghorbanpoor Zarehshuran ◽  
Hamideh Rahanjam ◽  
◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
World Trade Organization ◽  
World Trade ◽  
Developed Countries ◽  
New Drugs ◽  
Human Right ◽  
Pharmaceutical Patents ◽  
The World ◽  
Effective Drugs ◽  
Exclusive Right

Today, along with the relative expansion of public health around the world, various diseases such as AIDS, malaria, etc. are increasing in human societies. In this regard, the pharmaceutical industry is one of the most important industries that should be supported so that the inventors of new drugs have enough motivation to produce more effective drugs. On the other hand, the undeniable benefits of supporting pharmaceutical inventions pose a serious threat to developing and less developed countries, and may endanger the public health of these societies. In such situation, we should know which of these two principles is preferable to other and should be given priority: Public health as a basic human right or protection of pharmaceutical patents as an exclusive right of its owners? One of the most important issues discussed directly and indirectly in the World Trade Organization is ”public health”, especially the drug trade and the protection of pharmaceutical patents, and this organization has always protected the rights of drug inventors to maintain a balance between public health and freedom of access to medicine. Therefore, any legal system that wants to join this organization may face problems due to these two issues. This study aims to investigate the conditions and challenges of supporting pharmaceutical patents in legal systems in case of accession to the World Trade Organization.

A Decade of the World Trade Organization and the Trade Performance of Muslim Countries

2010 ◽  
Vol 27 (4) ◽  
pp. 23-44
Author(s):  
Ruzita Mohd. Amin
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
World Trade Organization ◽  
World Trade ◽  
Developed Countries ◽  
Playing Field ◽  
Muslim Countries ◽  
The World ◽  
The Developed Countries ◽  
Merchandise Trade ◽  
Wto Agreements

The World Trade Organization (WTO), established on 1 January 1995 as a successor to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), has played an important role in promoting global free trade. The implementation of its agreements, however, has not been smooth and easy. In fact this has been particularly difficult for developing countries, since they are expected to be on a level playing field with the developed countries. After more than a decade of existence, it is worth looking at the WTO’s impact on developing countries, particularly Muslim countries. This paper focuses mainly on the performance of merchandise trade of Muslim countries after they joined the WTO. I first analyze their participation in world merchandise trade and highlight their trade characteristics in general. This is then followed by a short discussion on the implications of WTO agreements on Muslim countries and some recommendations on how to face this challenge.

Protecting Global Brands: Toward a Global Norm

2002 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 99-112 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kate Gillespie ◽  
Kishore Krishna ◽  
Susan Jarvis
Keyword(s):  
World Trade Organization ◽  
World Trade ◽  
Resource Constraints ◽  
Developed Countries ◽  
Industrialized Countries ◽  
Newly Industrialized Countries ◽  
The Past ◽  
The World ◽  
Managerial Implications ◽  
Trademark Protection

In 1995, the World Trade Organization bound member countries to new standards of foreign trademark protection. Developed countries were given a year to bring their national trademark regimes into compliance. Other countries were allowed from 5 to 11 years. In the past 7 years, governments have taken many steps to reach compliance. Nonetheless, many countries fall short of the envisaged global norm. To better understand the challenges of the past several years, the authors focus on the state of national trademark regimes on the eve of the establishment of the World Trade Organization. The authors particularly address how contagion influence, resource constraints, and xenophobia affected treaty participation, domestic trademark law, application processing, and the relative treatment of foreign and domestic applications. The authors analyze data for 62 countries, which suggest that distinct patterns of foreign trademark protection existed for developed countries, newly industrialized countries, less developed countries, and transitional economies. The authors explain the managerial implications of these findings and argue that there is evidence that countries are moving toward global norms in trademark protection. However, an international treaty is the beginning, not the end, of this process.

The Have Nots Have It: Triumph Of Developing Countries At The World Trade OrganizationMeeting In Geneva

2011 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
RamMohan R. Yallapragada ◽  
Ron M. Sardessai ◽  
Madhu R. Paruchuri
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
World Trade Organization ◽  
World Trade ◽  
Developed Countries ◽  
Export Subsidies ◽  
G 21 ◽  
The World ◽  
The Developed Countries ◽  
Farm Subsidies ◽  
The Eu

In July 2004, 147 World Trade Organization (WTO) member countries met in Geneva where the developed countries agreed to cut back and eventually eliminate an estimated $350 billion of their farm and export subsidies. The accord was hammered out by five WTO members including India and Brazil and submitted to the WTOs plenary session where it was finally ratified on July 31, 2004. The Fifth Ministerial Conference of the World Trade Organization held in Cancun in September 2003 collapsed from inside as internal squabbles and irreconcilable philosophical differences developed between the developed countries and the developing countries. The WTO, which started with noble objectives of raising the global standards of living through international trade agreements and cooperation among the WTO member countries, appeared to be teetering on the verge of a complete collapse. Over the past decade, through five ministerial conferences, the WTO member countries gradually got polarized into two main blocks, the haves and the have nots, the developed countries and the still developing countries respectively. One of the important items of contention was the issue of reduction and elimination of the huge farm subsidies in the European Union (EU) and the United States (US). At the 2003 WTO conference in Cancun, 21 of the developing countries formed a group, known as G-21 initiated under the leadership of Brazil and India, and insisted on discussions for elimination of the farm subsidies of the EU-US combine. The EU and US governments give billions of dollars worth of agricultural and export subsidies annually to their farmers that allow them to have a competitive advantage in international markets in effect preventing agricultural producers in developing countries from having access to global markets. The EU delegates insisted that the four Singapore issues must be dealt with first before including any discussions on the issues of farm subsidies on the agenda. The G-21 over night swelled into G-70. The developing countries refused to be pushed into a corner and have proved that they are now a force to reckon with. The WTO Cancun conference came to a dramatic end without any agreement, leaving the negotiations in a deadlock. At the historic July 2004 WTO negotiations in Geneva, an accord has been reached under which the developed countries agreed to reduce and eventually eliminate their export and farm subsidies. The developing countries also agreed to lower their tariffs on imports from EU-US and other developed countries. The accord is expected to pave the way for the resumption of the WTO Doha Round of multilateral negotiations to liberalize world trade.

scholarly journals CHALLENGES FACED BY THE WTO’S ECONOMIC SYSTEM IN TRADE IN SERVICES NEGOTIATIONS

2019 ◽  
Vol 4 (8) ◽  
pp. 121-125
Author(s):  
Nino Parsadanishvili
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
International Trade ◽  
World Trade Organization ◽  
World Trade ◽  
Developed Countries ◽  
Decision Making Process ◽  
Special Focus ◽  
Trade In Services ◽  
Least Developed Countries ◽  
The World

resent paper focuses on current crises in international trade in services negotiations from the perspective of consideration of trading interests of developing and least developed countries in line with the operational agenda of the World Trade Organization (WTO). Through the analysis of the existing international legal texts and scholarly works particular attention is paid to the different rounds of trade in services negotiations in parallel to the consideration of the results of relevant ministerial conferences of the World Trade Organization, drawing attention to the situation with regards of consideration of the interests of developing and least developed country members of the WTO. Special focus is paid to the complexity of the decision making process and it’s complication over time due to increased participation of parties concerned in the process of trade in services negotiations resulting in no progress in the overall process. Next to analyzing the challenges faced by the WTO in trade in services negotiations, especially in terms of considering the interests of developing and least developed countries, paper shows the ways that could be used during 2020 Kazakhstan Ministerial Conference of the World Trade Organization for finding solutions to simplify the decision making process and establish freer international trade in services by the way of either implying new approaches in interpreting the existing multilateral treaties that deal with trade in services between all member states of the WTO or deepening the discussions on a new plurilateral agreement helping the organization to overcome the stagnated process of trade in services negotiations and therefore ensuring the compliance with it’s own operational goals.

scholarly journals Improving the effectiveness of the special and differential treatment of the World Trade Organization

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Fitria Anindhita H. Wibowo
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
World Trade Organization ◽  
World Trade ◽  
Developed Countries ◽  
Differential Treatment ◽  
Preferential Treatment ◽  
The World ◽  
Slow Progress ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Way

<p>This paper deals with the subject of Special and Differential Treatment (SDT) of the World Trade Organization (WTO), a special right that allows developing countries preferential treatment by other member countries, particularly developed countries. The paper more specifically discusses the ineffectiveness of the SDT owing to its structure and formulation, and explores the factors that have caused such ineffectiveness. It touches upon the provisions and the ways in which they are formulated and implemented, which deemed to have lead to the ineffectiveness. An observation of the way that negotiations are conducted and the underlying interests that direct those negotiations also contribute to the slow progress of introducing changes to the provisions. Furthermore, this paper analyses and identifies steps that may be taken to improve the concept, formulation, and implementation of SDT, inter alia through amendments of the provisions and conduct of negotiations. The paper also looks at several dispute cases which highlight the ineffectiveness of the existing provisions in advancing the interests of developing countries in particular and in fulfilling its purpose in general.</p>

World Trade Organization and BRICS

2020 ◽  
pp. 63-92
Author(s):  
Martin Daunton
Keyword(s):  
International Trade ◽  
World Trade Organization ◽  
World Trade ◽  
Global Economy ◽  
Developed Countries ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Industrial Countries ◽  
The World ◽  
International Trade Organization ◽  
Second World

The World Trade Organization emerged from the Uruguay Round of 1986 to 1994 and covered development as well as trade—an ambition that had been attempted after the Second World War and the abortive attempt to create an International Trade Organization. Instead, a narrower General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade emerged. The failure of the International Trade Organization arose in part from the different ambitions of less developed or primary producing countries that were not acceptable to advanced industrial countries. The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade faced continued pressure from the less developed countries, in particular from the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development which put forward a different approach to the global economy and issues of distributive justice. This chapter explains the different approaches and the responses of the more advanced countries.

scholarly journals The role of coalitions at international tariff negotiations: a CGE perspective

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Florian Freund
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
World Trade Organization ◽  
World Trade ◽  
Developed Countries ◽  
Least Developed Countries ◽  
Equal Distribution ◽  
The World ◽  
Equity Effects ◽  
Empirical Implications

AbstractDeveloping countries coalitions form an integral part of tariff negotiations that take place under the aegis of the World Trade Organization. While there was only a single coalition in the 70s, their number increased to 31 in the year 2005. Despite the apparent proliferation of coalitions in tariff negotiations, little research on their theoretical and empirical implications has been produced. In particular, we lack an understanding of efficiency and equity effects of coalitions. By exploring this equity-efficiency nexus, the study finds that developing countries coalitions like the G-90 and the Least Developed Countries Group – while benefiting member countries – lead to less efficiency and less equity overall. Forming the Cairns Group, however, leads to a more efficient and equal distribution of the gains from trade.

scholarly journals Development Cooperation Within the Framework of the World Trade Organization

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Małgorzata Zajaczkowski ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
World Trade Organization ◽  
International Development ◽  
World Trade ◽  
Developed Countries ◽  
Development Cooperation ◽  
The World ◽  
Scientific Papers ◽  
Rules And Principles ◽  
Development Goals

The book addresses the issues of international development cooperation and the involvement of the World Trade Organization (WTO) in activities supporting developing countries in their integration into the world trading system. The author's intention was to examine what kind of role and significance the WTO plays in the area of development cooperation, assuming that a number of the organization’s activities fall within the scope of assistance. To this end, the types of activities have been specified, defined and explained. The author has done so on the basis of a critical analysis of the following areas: development assistance mechanisms and instruments, principles and rules of trade policy, GATT and WTO multilateral negotiations, special forms of cooperation between the WTO and developing countries. A qualitative study was conducted based on empirical data contained in documents, reports, scientific papers as well as OECD, WTO and UNCTAD statistical databases. The author has made an assessment of the WTO's action in the field of development cooperation, which is - so far - ambiguous and unclear. Nevertheless, the direction of evolution of the WTO strongly indicates the option of greater involvement and support of developing countries in their process of economic modernization. This is in line with the expectations of WTO's members, most of which include developing countries. In light of the ongoing debate on the future of the WTO, these countries are counting on greater support to achieve their trade-related development goals. In turn, it is in the interest of highly developed countries (USA, EU) to increase the effectiveness of the organization. This means changing trade rules and principles to adapt to new international conditions, including the adoption of a new type of support for less developed countries.

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