Press release
TRIPS accord: EP assent postponed again
External/international trade - 09-10-2007 - 13:56
Committees
Committees
On Tuesday 9 October the EP International Trade Committee again postponed its vote on granting Parliament's assent to amendment to the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS). This was the third postponement. MEPs are still awaiting Council undertakings on when developing countries may use the flexibility provided for under the TRIPS agreement to produce or import generic substitutes for patented medicines.
The International Trade Committee postponed this vote to 22 October in Strasbourg, because the EU's Portuguese presidency still had not replied to the requests set out in a resolution voted in plenary session on 12 July 2007 in Strasbourg. Parliament, Council and Commission representatives are meanwhile to meet informally on 17 October to try to respond to MEPs' requests.
Parliament's conditions
In its 12 July 2007 resolution, the EP called on the Council to state, in a joint political declaration, that the Member States are free to use the exception provision of the TRIPS Agreement to authorise production and export "to address public health needs in importing Members".
For MEPs, the mechanism created by the Doha declaration and set in place in 2003 is only a "part of the solution to the problem". So far only Rwanda has stated (on 19 July) its intention to using compulsory licensing as an importer. Canada was the first country to notify the World Trade Organization (WTO), on 4 october 2007, that it had authorized a company to manufacture a generic version of a patented medicine for export: TriAvir, a combination of three AIDS drugs, will be exported to Rwanda.
Economic partnership agreements
Parliament also urged the Council to restrict the Commission's negotiating mandate to ensure that it does not negotiate pharmaceutical-related "TRIPS-plus" provisions affecting public health and access to medicines in Economic Partnership Agreements with the African, Caribbean and Pacific states and other future and regional agreements with developing countries.
Doha declaration
This mechanism was set in train by the Doha declaration adopted at the WTO ministerial conference in November 2001. It was then confirmed by a decision of the WTO General Council on 30 August 2003, which authorised countries that lack the capacity to manufacture generic substitutes for patented medicines under locally-granted compulsory licences, to obtain imports of these medicines.
Ratification
As soon as two thirds of WTO members (100 of its 151 member states) have formally accepted the amendment, it will apply to those members that have accepted it and replace the 2003 derogation. As of 28 September 2007, eleven countries had accepted the amendment: Australia, the USA, India, Israel, Japan, Norway, the Philippines, the Republic of Korea, Salvador, Singapore and Switzerland.
Procedure: assent
Committee vote: 22 Octobre 2007 (Strasbourg)
Pleneary vote: November
08/10/2007
Committee on International Trade
In the chair : Helmuth Markov (GUE/NGL, DE)
In the chair : Helmuth Markov (GUE/NGL, DE)
REF.: 20071008IPR11326