Ambassador Dacio Castillo (Honduras)

World Trade Organization

11 CONTRIBUTION OF INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY TO FACILITATE THE TRANSFER OF ENVIRONMENTALLY RATIONAL TECHNOLOGY

361. The rules of procedure for meetings of the General Council, which in this respect also apply to the TRIPS Council, provide that "its shall be open to any Member to suggest items for inclusion in the proposed agenda up to, and not including, the day on which the notice of the meeting is to be issued", and that "requests for items to be placed on the agenda of forthcoming meetings shall be communicated to the Secretariat in writing, together with accompanying documentation to be issued in connection with that item". So this is the normal procedure when a delegation wants to put any additional items on the proposed agenda. Our practice has been that if the same delegation or some other delegation wants to revert to such a matter at a subsequent meeting, then it submits a new request. As you are aware, there are a number of themes to which the Council has returned several times, not necessarily at the request of the same delegation, but also by another delegation, or sometimes by groups of delegations. Of course the Council can take a decision by consensus to revert to such a matter at its next meeting. However, the normal and non-controversial procedure is, where a delegation wants to continue the discussion of such an item, that it submits a written request after which the item will be included on the proposed agenda.

The Council took note of the statements made.

11.1. The Chairman said that this item had been put on the agenda at the written request by the delegation of Ecuador. He recalled that, at the Council's meeting in March 2013, Ecuador had briefly presented, under "Other Business", its submission entitled "Contribution of Intellectual Property for Facilitating the Transfer of Environmentally Rational Technology" (IP/C/W/585 in English and French, and IP/C/W/Rev.1 in Spanish). That document had been discussed at the Council's meeting of June 2013 under agenda item "Intellectual Property, Climate Change and Development" that had been put on the agenda at the request of Ecuador. At Ecuador's request, the Council had continued this discussion at its meeting in October.

11.2. The representatives of Ecuador, Cuba, Chile, El Salvador, the European Union, India, Japan, Switzerland, the United States, China, South Africa, Australia, Brazil, and Benin took the floor under this agenda item.

11.3. The Council took note of the statements made.

IP/C/M/75, IP/C/M/75/Add.1