Mail & Guardian (Johannesburg)
Heather Stewart
20 September 2002
opinion
Johannesburg — The fight against poverty in the developing world is being hampered by stringent patent laws imposed by rich countries, an independent commission said last week.
Protecting patent rights through the Trips (trade-related intellectual property rights) agreement pushes up the price of medicines and seeds for poor countries, with most of the benefits going to the developed world, according to the commission on intellectual property rights set up by the United Kingdom's International Development Secretary Clare Short.
"Developed countries often proceed on the assumption that what is good for them is likely to be good for developing countries," said Professor John Barton, a Stanford University law professor and chairperson of the commission.
"But developing countries should not be encouraged or coerced into adopting stronger intellectual property rights without regard to the impact this has on their development and poor people."
Warning that the cost of drugs is likely to go up as a result of Trips, the commission said "differential pricing" should be used so that poor countries can afford to fight diseases such as Aids and malaria.
The commission also believes developing countries should be allowed to opt out of implementing some aspects of the Trips agreement -- on patenting plants and animals, for example -- where the costs outweigh the benefits.
Development campaigners welcomed the findings, but said they would have liked to see the commission go further and call for the wholesale revision of the Trips deal to tip the balance back in favour of developing countries.
Ruth Mayne, policy adviser at Oxfam, described the report as "a powerful evidence-based critique by an eminent group of experts of the health and development problems caused by Trips", and said the UK government should take the lead on demanding a renegotiation of Trips, separate from the current World Trade Organisation talks. -- © Guardian Newspapers 2002
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