335. The representative of the Secretariat said that the previous day had seen the third in the series of workshops on the implementation of Article 66.2. This workshop had been undertaken in coordination with the LDC Group to complement the more formal review of implementation of this provision that took place in the TRIPS Council. It had drawn together the two groups of Members most directly concerned – the LDC Members themselves, and the developed country Members who submit annual reports on their implementation of this provision. The event had been structured to enable notifying Members to outline their activities under Article 66.2, to give LDC Members the opportunity to pose questions and comment on specific aspects of those reports, and then to facilitate a wider dialogue about the implementation of the provision and the reporting and review mechanism. The workshop had opened with an overview of the LDC Group's interests and concerns provided by the delegation of Angola, and it had heard reports from Australia, Canada, the European Union, Japan, New Zealand, Norway, Switzerland, and the United States.
336. Discussions had centered on two general themes: the content and format of Article 66.2 reporting and the substantive aspects of implementation of Article 66.2. Noting that the Members concerned might wish to put on record their own positions and observations, he said that he would confine his report to a simple synopsis. On the notification process, reporting on Article 66.2 implementation had included a great deal of detailed factual information and descriptive text. There had been now 89 documents in this series, some running to over 100 pages, or altogether over 11MB of text, posing a practical challenge for learning from this wealth of information. While LDC Members had been able to undertake some systematic analysis of these reports, this effort would be facilitated for future notifications by some convergence on the structure and format of the notifications; several Members had individually developed ideas on structuring their reports and the LDC Group had suggested an illustrative format which had been introduced by the delegations of Angola and Zambia.
337. On the substantive aspects, discussions had covered the scope and definition of transfer of technology in general terms, in relation to the Article 66.2 provision itself, and in other specific contexts; the specificity of reported programmes provided for LDCs in particular; the nature of incentives for technology transfer; choice of appropriate technology in line with priority needs identified by the LDCs themselves; sustainability in ensuring continued access to technology on which training was given; and the distinction between incentives for technology transfer to be reported upon under Article 66.2 and the technical assistance activities to be reported upon under Article 67.
338. He observed that further work would be directed by the Members concerned, principally the LDC Members, but that the Secretariat was at hand as a resource to the extent that it could play a useful role in supporting and facilitating future work. One possibility would be to work towards a more systematic analysis of submissions, for consideration at a future workshop, and including the implementation of the ideas circulated for convergence on structure and format of notifications to facilitate consideration of future notifications. However, any such work – if considered useful – would entail finding the necessary resources, and continuing guidance from the delegations most concerned and interested in information on the implementation of Article 66.2. Given the informal feedback already received from the most recent workshop, the Secretariat was provisionally planning to proceed with a follow-up workshop the following year, as a minimum step, but again would be guided by the interests and priorities of the delegations concerned and of course the LDC Group in particular.
