WIPO Assemblies Meeting this Week

A meeting of the Assemblies of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), bringing together representatives of WIPO’s 181 member states, is being held in Geneva from September 27 to October 5, 2004. Here are the highlights of the Assemblies Agenda in proposed order of discussion:

• Member states will review the status of consultations on outstanding issues relating to the protection of audiovisual performances and decide on future action on this question. (Please see Update 227/2004 & PR 367/2003)
• The WIPO General Assembly will consider approving the convening, at an appropriate time, of a Diplomatic Conference on the protection of broadcasting organizations to update international intellectual property standards for broadcasting in the information age. A growing signal piracy problem in many parts of the world, including piracy of digitized pre-broadcast signals, has made this need more acute. (Please see WIPO/PR/2004/386).
• WIPO member states will consider a recommendation to approve the convening of a Diplomatic Conference for the Adoption of a Revised Trademark Law Treaty in the first half of 2006. The revision of the TLT envisages the inclusion of provisions on electronic filing of trademark applications and associated communications, provisions concerning the recording of trademark licenses, relief measures when certain time limits have been missed, and the establishment of an assembly of the contracting parties.
• The General Assembly will also review the work of the WIPO Advisory Committee on Enforcement (ACE). The ACE was set up by WIPO member states in 2002 as a forum for discussion of enforcement matters with a mandate to provide technical assistance and coordination, cooperation and the exchange of information on questions of enforcement. (Please see Update 227/2004)
• The General Assembly will consider a progress report (document WO/GA/31/5) on the work of the WIPO Intergovernmental Committee on Intellectual Property and Genetic Resources, Traditional Knowledge and Folklore (IGC).
• The Assembly will also consider the relationship between the patent system and legal regimes governing access to genetic resources and equitably sharing benefits from the use of these resources. A number of countries have called for various changes to patent law standards to require patent applicants to declare where they obtained genetic resources or TK used in a claimed invention.
• Member states will also discuss the future work plan of the Standing Committee on the Law of Patents as regards the draft Substantive Patent Law Treaty (SPLT) on the basis of a proposal by the United States of America and Japan to limit the scope of the SPLT to an initial package of priority items relating to prior-art issues and to defer discussion of other issues of substantive patent law pending resolution of the initial package of issues.
• The Assembly of the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) will consider progress made in the reform of the PCT and PCT automation projects and will consider a proposal from the secretariat to readjust the PCT international filing fee upward by 12%.
• Delegates will review one of the major programs of WIPO, namely the assistance the Organization provides to developing countries in order for each country to use its national intellectual property system to achieve national development goals particularly aimed at creating employment, facilitating world trade and stimulating wealth creation.
• The WIPO General Assembly will also consider a proposal from Argentina and Brazil relating to the establishment of a new development agenda for WIPO including amendment of the WIPO Convention (1967) to ensure that the development dimension of WIPO’s work is enshrined in the Organization’s work program.
• The WIPO General Assembly will be briefed on the status of recommendations approved by member states in 2002 to amend the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP) to provide protection for country names and for the names and acronyms of intergovernmental organizations (IGOs). These recommendations are currently being considered by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). (Please see PR/2003/363)