Not Tripping over TRIPS: An Analysis of Necessity and Legality of the COVID-19 TRIPS Waiver Proposal

The availability of vaccinations against COVID-19 provides hope for containing the epidemic, which has already claimed over 2.84 million lives. However, inoculating millions of individuals worldwide would need large vaccine manufacturing followed by fair distribution. A barrier to vaccine development and dissemination is the developers' intellectual property rights. India and South Africa have jointly sought to the World Trade Organization that certain TRIPS rules of COVID-19 vaccines, medicines, and treatments be waived. This piece argues for such a waiver, highlighting the unique circumstances that exist. It believes that TRIPS's flexibilities are inadequate to cope with the present epidemic, particularly for nations without pharmaceutical manufacturing competence.

IMPLEMENTATION OF PATENT AND TRANSFER OF PATENT RIGHTS ACCORDING TO INDONESIAN PATENT LAW

Indonesia as a member of the World Trade Organization (“WTO”) is obliged to comply with the provisions stipulated in the Trade-Related Intellectual Property Rights Agreement (“TRIPs Agreement”) especially regarding Patents; therefore, the Government of Indonesia regulates the provisions regarding Patents by Law Number 13 of 2016 concerning Patent which has been amended through Law Number 11 of 2020 Concerning Job Creation (“Indonesia Patent Law”). Article 20 of Indonesian Patent Law regulates that “the implementation of Patents must be implemented in Indonesia which can be done by making, importing, and licensing.”. Related to the protection of patent rights granted, the state also hopes to transfer technology from Patent Holders; thus, their inventions can be produced and used without paying royalties to Patent Holders. However, the provisions regulated by the Government of Indonesia stipulate that the implementation of Patent can be carried out by importing, which will result in no transfer of technology from the Patent Holders to the state; thus, it will be detrimental to Indonesia. Therefore this paper will examine and explain the impact of applying Article 20 of the Indonesian Patent Law, especially regarding the implementation of Patent and transfer of Patent Rights.AbstrakIndonesia sebagai anggota World Trade Organization (“WTO”) wajib memenuhi ketentuan yang ditetapkan dalam Trade-Related Intellectual Property Rigths Agreement (“TRIPs Agreement”) terutama mengenai Paten, oleh karena itu, Pemerintah Indonesia mengatur ketentuan mengenai Patent melalui Undang-Undang Nomor 13 Tahun 2016 tentang Paten yang telah diubah melalui Undang-Undang Nomor 11 Tahun 2020 tentang Cipta Kerja (“UU Paten Indonesia”). Pasal 20 UU Paten Indonesia mengatur bahwa “implementasi Paten harus dilaksanakan di Indonesia yang dapat dilakukan dengan membuat, mengimpor, dan lisensi.”. Pada dasarnya terkait dengan perlindungan Hak Paten yang diberikan, negara juga berharap untuk terjadinya peralihan teknologi dari Pemegang Paten sehingga invensi mereka dapat diproduksi dan digunakan tanpa harus membayar royalty kepada Pemegang Paten. Namun, ketentuan yang diatur oleh Pemerintah Indonesia menetapkan bahwa implementasi Paten dapat dilakukan dengan importasi yang mana hal tersebut tidak akan menghasilkan peralihan teknologi dari Pemegang Paten kepada negara sehingga akan merugikan Indonesia. Oleh karena itu paper ini akan mengkaji dan menjelaskan dampak penerapan Pasal 20 UU Paten Indonesia khususnya mengenai implementasi Paten dan transfer Hak Patent.

Policy renewal of Indonesian mineral and coal smelters for Global Impact

This research is normative law. The rule of law gives the highest supremacy to a country in providing welfare and forming legal norms, the ratification of GATT through Law No.7 of 1994 concerning Ratification of the Agreement Establishing The World Trade Organization (ADDITIONAL TO STATE GAZETTE OF THE REPUBLIC OF INDONESIA NO. 3564) is the rule of law that has the highest supremacy, the result is to comply with the ratified GATT legal norms where the related parties of the public contract agreement can exercise the right to test for inconsistencies.

Intellectual property rights and its implications for the pharmaceutical industry in Iraq under accession to the World Trade Organization

The main risks arising from the WTO Agreement are the inequality and lack of competitiveness of most pharmaceutical goods, as well as the fact that Iraq is a net importer of medicines that are at the core of consumer needs, The subject matter of the Convention on the Protection of Intellectual Property Rights and its implications for the pharmaceutical industry, in particular, coinciding with the situation of financial and administrative corruption, all of which has resulted in drug fraud in the Iraqi market and its impact on public health. The control of medical technology, the persistence of the technological gap and its effects on high price levels, and the fact that domestic drug producers are obliged to obtain production licenses from global companies in the light of limited access to pharmaceutical research and development. The research aims at the impact of economic liberalization within the World Trade Organization (WTO) and its negative effects on consumers by highlighting the economic and social effects on consumption by raising prices and monopolies and restricting the volume of consumer demand because of the loss of the competitive advantage of pharmaceutical goods. Iraq's unwillingness to accede to the International Convention for the Protection of Intellectual Property Rights of the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the deterioration of the pharmaceutical industry meant increased dependence on the outside, increased trade deficits, higher price levels, and its adverse effects on consumers. Iraq finds it difficult for developed countries to use their intellectual rights as well as restrict industrial and agricultural work because production and production methods are now subject to their intellectual property protection law, which prevents any possible industrial development. The most significant potential short-term impact of TRIPS is the decline in drug production, which continues to be protected. The great challenge for drug producers is the need to

The Waiver of Certain Intellectual Property Rights Provisions of the TRIPS for the Prevention, Containment and Treatment of COVID-19: A Review of the Proposal under WTO Jurisprudence

This article is a critical legal analysis of the proposed TRIPS waiver under World Trade Organization (WTO) law. It reviews the existing TRIPS flexibilities and the “August 2003 TRIPS waiver”, highlighting the obstacles to achieving the goals of these legal instruments. It demonstrates that numerous critical TRIPS flexibilities, notably TRIPS Article 31bis, are ineffective, prompting some countries to submit a new waiver proposal to the WTO. It highlights several WTO rules that are also quite ambiguous. This paper argues that a WTO clarification might be an alternative to the new TRIPS waiver proposal if it is ultimately rejected due to a lack of consensus among WTO members. Finally, this article emphasises the importance of adopting a balanced approach that may simplify complicated TRIPS rules, decrease the risk of trade-based retaliation and improve collaboration in knowledge transfer and scaling up the manufacture of and access to lifesaving vaccines, pharmaceuticals and healthcare equipment.

Consensus and Diversity in the World Trade Organization: A Queer Perspective

When the World Trade Organization (WTO) was established in 1995, it was seen as representative of a new era in international law, which claimed to be more functional and cooperative than the Cold War years. Fast forward to 2022, most commentators proclaim that the WTO is in “crisis.” For over two decades, its membership has struggled to reach decisions and, in 2019, the WTO was “dejudicialized” by the United States blocking consensus on appointments to the Appellate Body. In seeking to understand what went wrong, some commentators have focused on the operation of the WTO's consensus procedure and, in particular, the way it can afford states a veto power. In this essay, I take a different approach by considering how the discursive effects of consensus decision making have played into some of the problems facing the WTO today. Inspired by Gibson-Graham's work on “queering the economy,” I do so by unmooring queer theory from its base of gender and sexuality and applying queer insights to a discourse analysis of statements made in relation to the Uruguay Round of multilateral trade negotiations, which lasted from 1986 until 1993 and culminated in the agreement to establish the WTO. I show how the use of consensus decision making served to cultivate an intolerance of economic difference by giving rise to discourses of worldwide sameness and agreement. Finally, I consider what a queerer approach to trade-related decision making might look like.

ANALYSIS OF REGULATED PROCUREMENT PROCEDURES IN THE REPUBLIC OF KAZAKHSTAN FOR LOCAL CONTENT REQUIREMENTS

In connection with membership in the World Trade Organization and the Eurasian Economic Union, the Republic of Kazakhstan has taken several obligations to create equal conditions for producers of goods, works and services of all participating countries. This circumstance makes it difficult to provide direct support to domestic producers. The purchases of government bodies, quasi-government organizations and subsoil users of solid minerals, hydrocarbons and uranium (government-regulated purchases) create a significant volume of demand for various kinds of goods, works and services. Therefore, within the framework of the research, a literary review of the regulatory legal acts governing the procurement of these entities was carried out. An assessment of the norms contributing to an increase in the share of local content in purchases is given. As a result, proposals were formed to improve legislation in order to increase the effectiveness of these norms.

Effects of international trade on world agricultural production and productivity: evidence from a panel of 126 countries 1962-2014

General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) was notable in largely excluding agriculture whereas the World Trade Organization (WTO) brought agriculture into the world trade rules. This article aims to evaluate the impacts of trade on agriculture production and productivity, especially the changes between the GATT and WTO periods. Using a panel of 126 countries from 1962-2014, this article derives not only spillover effects that were overlooked, but also provides more accurate productivity than was estimated with bias in literature for both periods. We find that trade hindered agriculture production and productivity in the GATT period but improved agriculture production and productivity in the WTO period.