Compte rendu ‒ Conseil des ADPIC ‒ Afficher les détails de l'intervention/la déclaration

Ambassador C. Trevor Clarke (Barbados)
Adoption of the agenda
2. The representative of China said that similar proposals to that of the United States had been put on the agendas of the last three meetings of the Council in the year 2006. All of these had been challenged by a number of developing country Members on the basis of the following reasons. Firstly, Article 1.1 of the TRIPS Agreement provided that "Members shall be free to determine the appropriate method of implementing the provisions of this Agreement within their own legal system and practice". Therefore, enforcement measures should be adopted mainly at the national level. Most developing country Members had devoted enormous administrative and judicial resources to IPR enforcement with significant progress in this field, and these efforts were still continuing. 3. Secondly, multilateral exchange of information among countries or groups of countries on enforcement of IPRs, including border measures, had been taking place either in WIPO or in the WCO. Bilateral cooperation, including the exchange of information and views, had also been conducted in the spirit of Article 69 of the Agreement which had been quoted by the United States in its paper. The inclusion of proposals such as those put forward by the United States and previously by other developed country Members for any discussion in the Council would therefore duplicate the work that was already being carried out in the relevant international organizations referred to. It would not add any value and would therefore waste the resources of Members and the Organization. 4. Thirdly, enforcement of IPRs was not an isolated issue and could not be treated separately from the basic objectives and principles for the implementation of the Agreement as a whole. Articles 7 and 8 of the Agreement had laid down provisions on the relationship between the appropriate protection of IPRs and the economic and social development needs and objectives of developing country Members, including the transfer of technology. However, it was China's view that the specific provisions in and the implementation of the Agreement with regard to the protection of IPRs as emphasized by the developed country Members on the one hand and the developmental aspects as requested by the developing country Members on the other were out of balance. Any substantive discussion in the Council on such proposals as put forward by the United States and other developed country Members on enforcement would only further the imbalance of interests, as well as of rights and obligations between developed and developing country Members already in existence. It would also further divert Members' attention from the Council's work in addressing urgent development issues such as the effective implementation of the 2003 General Council Decision on TRIPS and Public Health, the debate on the relationship between TRIPS and CBD, the protection of traditional knowledge and folklore, and the needs of developing country Members, in particular LDCs, for technical assistance and capacity building and transfer of technology. 5. Based upon this reasoning, China continued to believe firmly that the TRIPS Council was not the right forum for any substantive discussion of proposals such as that put forward by the United States. China was therefore not in favour of and did not support the inclusion of Item K on enforcement on the agenda of the Council's present meeting. Having said this, his delegation wished to listen to any comments by other Members and would respect any decision the Council might take with regard to the agenda, including its possible adoption. China would do so only for the sake of a smooth procedural conduct of the meeting and on the understanding that this would not prejudice the fact that this was only a temporary item on the agenda.
IP/C/M/53