31. The Chairman recalled that, at its first meeting, the TRIPS Council had agreed to set aside for the time being consideration of those notification requirements under provisions of the Berne Convention and the Rome Convention that were incorporated by reference into the TRIPS Agreement but not explicitly referred to in it. These had been listed in paragraphs 7 to 9 of document PC/IPL/7/Add.1. At the TRIPS Council's first meeting, the Council had agreed to focus first on the various notification provisions that had been dealt with so far. One thought had been that, having gained experience in dealing with those notification provisions, it would be easier for the Council to deal with the remaining matters. He believed that this should be the case, especially as these notification provisions would seem to raise similar issues to those that had been dealt with in respect of Articles 1.3 and 3.1 of the TRIPS Agreement, which also related to provisions of the Berne Convention and the Rome Convention. He suggested that the Secretariat be asked to prepare a background document setting out, first, the nature of the various notification provisions in question; second, the information that the Secretariat would be able to obtain, with the assistance of WIPO and the United Nations Legal Office, on the notifications that had already been made under the relevant provisions of the Berne Convention and the Rome Convention by TRIPS Members; and third, taking into account the way the TRIPS Agreement had handled other notification provisions, come forward with options for how the TRIPS Council might give effect also to these requirements. The Council could then come back to this issue at its next meeting.
