5.33. The representative of the United States said that Members themselves were in the best position to describe their perspectives on the negotiations in the WIPO IGC. To his understanding, China had been present at those negotiations and the United States looked forward to hearing from China on its perspective. He asked for clarification on whether China suggested that a report from the WIPO Secretariat be a condition precedent for any intervention from China on that issue.
5.34. He said that the IGC had continued text-based negotiations related to the protection of genetic resources, and had begun with a review of a "Consolidated Document Relating to Intellectual Property and Genetic Resources". An informal expert group, including representatives of WIPO member states and indigenous peoples, had worked to identify the core issues, reduce the number of options and streamline the text. At the IGC, there remained a wide diversity of views regarding whether the work related to genetic resources should have as an objective to ensure that patents were appropriately granted, or whether the objective should be to ensure compliance with national laws with respect to prior informed consent and benefit sharing. The draft text that had resulted at the end of the session had a number of options and bracketed text. That draft text would be transmitted to the WIPO General Assembly, which would meet from 23 September to 2 October 2013. In accordance with the IGC's mandate and work programme for 2013, the WIPO General Assembly would take stock of progress made and decide on whether to convene a diplomatic conference. In addition to the text that would be considered by the WIPO General Assembly, new documents considered included: a Joint Recommendation on Genetic Resources and Associated Traditional Knowledge (by Canada, Japan, Norway, Korea and the United States); a Proposal for the Terms of Reference for a Study by the WIPO Secretariat on Measures Related to the Avoidance of the Erroneous Grant of Patents and Compliance with Existing Access and Benefit-Sharing Systems (submitted by Canada, Japan, Korea and the United States); and a Joint Recommendation on the Use of Databases for the Defensive Protection of Genetic Resources and Traditional Knowledge Associated with Genetic Resources (submitted by Canada, Japan, Korea and the United States). The United States, like many WTO Members, had been actively participating in the negotiations of the IGC, and looked forward to working to advance the IGC's discussions.
5.35. With regard to the request for a presentation from the CBD Secretariat, he said that the United States was not in a position to support such a request. Turning to the request from Ecuador to update the three documents with information from the Council's recent meetings, he said that the request would amount to asking the Secretariat to pull Members' interventions from the minutes of the Council's meetings, which were already available to Members, and place citations to those interventions in a revised report. Given the limited value of such an intensive exercise, his delegation was not convinced that revising the 2006 documents to update footnotes would be a useful use of the WTO Secretariat's already constrained resources. As a result, his delegation did not support updating the three information documents.
5.36. Regarding patent disclosure requirements, he said that the proposals to mandate the disclosure of the source of genetic resources, prior informed consent, and mutually agreed terms, would neither improve the patent system, nor promote the shared objective of providing a mechanism to address misappropriation. Such proposals would inject significant uncertainty and unpredictability into a system that was essential to promoting the innovation that could solve many of the problems that faced the world. The risks posed were not worth the price, particularly when patent disclosure requirements would do so little to promote shared objectives. The patent examination process was not a suitable mechanism for ensuring compliance with unrelated regulatory requirements. The origin of genetic resources had as much of a rational relationship to the patent system as tax filings, vehicle permits, or workplace safety rules, in other words, no relationship at all. The best mechanism for addressing misappropriation would be to employ a contractual model within a national system, with the control and benefits retained by the holders of the underlying genetic resources and traditional knowledge. The contract approach encouraged research and development, and created a sustainable economic model. On the other hand, requiring disclosure of the origin of genetic resources added uncertainty to the patent system and would shift resources from researchers to patent attorneys, without improving the patent system. That requirement would also put any benefit sharing agreements at risk.
