[CTC] Okonjo-Iweala pushes WTO members to move on TRIPS talks or risk failure

[Arthur Stamoulis]

Okonjo-Iweala pushes WTO members to move on TRIPS talks or risk failure
Inside US Trade, 5/16/22 
 
With text-based talks on a compromise proposal to address intellectual property issues related to COVID-19 vaccines set to begin in earnest on Tuesday, World Trade Organization Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala on Monday implored members to negotiate in good faith and with haste, warning that not producing results would only further associate the organization with failure.
 
Okonjo-Iweala is a much more visible – and vocal – director-general than her predecessor, and she was blunt with WTO members on Monday during an informal meeting of the Council for Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, according to a Geneva-based trade official familiar with the meeting. Rather than “block everything at every stage in every negotiation,” she said she hoped members could produce actual results.
 
“What we're doing here is bigger than ourselves and is bigger than each member in this place,” she said, according to the official. “The world is looking on us to produce results, not to block everything at every stage in every negotiation, whether it's fisheries or response to the pandemic or agriculture.”

“Let's stop victimizing the people who sent us here,” she added.
 
The meeting on Monday set the stage for the text-based talks to come this week. Negotiators will focus first on the eligibility footnote in the compromise proposal, which features two sets of bracketed language. The first urges developing countries with vaccine export capacity to opt out of the options provided in the text and the second explicitly excludes those countries that exported more than 10 percent of global vaccine doses in 2021. The latter language is opposed by China, which said last week that if the bracketed language was removed from the proposal, it would commit not to utilizing <https://insidetrade.com/node/173979> any of the flexibilities outlined in the text. During Monday’s meeting, China suggested the inclusion of this version of the footnote would be a redline for Beijing.
 
But this commitment isn’t enough for the U.S., which wants the language to be “clear” that China cannot benefit from the proposal, as U.S. Ambassador to the WTO María Pagán told Bloomberg this week <https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-05-16/us-china-spat-may-spoil-global-deal-for-a-vaccine-patent-waiver?sref=0klsF1YE>.
 
“The second-largest economy in the world, which has Covid vaccines and mRNA technology, doesn’t need the waiver,” she said. “What we want is clarity.”
 
The other issues to be addressed on Tuesday and Wednesday – ahead of a meeting on Thursday to take stock of progress – include duration, scope and concerns about using a single authorization and listing patents. The TRIPS Council chair, Sierra Leone’s Ambassador Lansana Gberie, noted countries were likely to raise other issues but said the main concerns must be resolved for the talks to move forward, according to the Geneva official. Gberie urged delegations to work quickly and focus on what is essential for their support rather than what would be “nice to have.”
 
Okonjo-Iweala echoed this push, but she also praised members’ “very constructive spirit towards these negotiations,” according to the official. While all members are entitled to ask “every question,” she said, she argued that it should be with the purpose of finding a solution.
 
Citing a recent op-ed in The Hill <https://thehill.com/opinion/international/3488325-upcoming-trade-meeting-a-chance-for-wto-to-prove-its-still-relevant/>, the director-general told members that many are already predicting MC12 will be a failure before it has begun, according to the official. She asked them if that’s how they want the organization to be thought of – and she urged members to think outside the Geneva bubble and to stop making excuses.
 
The members who did take the floor on Monday raised some concerns with the proposal but also largely welcomed the start of text-based talks and pledged to work toward a deal. -- Hannah Monicken (hmonicken at iwpnews.com <mailto:hmonicken at iwpnews.com>)
 
Arthur Stamoulis
Citizens Trade Campaign
(202) 494-8826




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