Embargoed until April 19, 2001 Contact: Kristin Dawkins, 612-870-3410

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FTAA Negotiations on Intellectual Property

Threaten Access to Pharmaceuticals and Seeds,

Undermine International Agreements and Human Rights

Quebec City - As negotiators from throughout the Western Hemisphere gather in Quebec City to push for another free trade deal, representatives of civil society groups are gathering their voices in protest. Many groups object outright to the proposal of hemispheric trade liberalization. Others object to specific terms on the negotiating table, including the US proposal for more stringent intellectual property rights (IPRs) than currently exist.

Generally, most protesters would like to see a vision for cooperation in the region based on the needs of our peoples for a sustainable human development that is democratically participatory and transparent, equitable and respectful of the regenerative capacity of natural ecosystems.

The Free Trade Agreement of the Americas (FTAA), however, is premised on the further liberalization of commercial trade and it is being negotiated in virtual secrecy. The US negotiating position for FTAA, in fact, is the only one that has been made public. In a modern-day revival of the Monroe Doctrine, in which the rest of the Americas are viewed as the United States' "back yard," the US seeks to drive the negotiating process. Spokespersons for a number of organizations from across the Americas have expressed concerns.

"The FTAA negotiations are fundamentally illegitimate," says Alberto

Villareal of REDES-Friends of the Earth Uruguay. "They intend to go further than even the North American Free Trade Agreement or the World Trade Organization in deregulating global corporations. In these secretive meetings, they hope to set new extremes for liberalized trade that will become precedents to reopen the stalled WTO negotiations."

"As expected, the US seeks to tighten the protections of the pharmaceutical and agrichemical companies in ways that will slow the development of and access to new varieties of seeds and affordable drugs" says Kristin Dawkins, Vice President at the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy in Minneapolis. "The US proposal would allow the transnational private sector to appropriate the resources and knowledge of peoples throughout the world, with severe consequences for food security and health, especially in rural communities and especially for women who make up the majority of the world's farmers and the world's poor."

The details surrounding IPRs are expected to be one of the hot button issues during FTAA negotiations this week.

For instance, the US has argued that policies in Brazil and South Africa to provide free and affordable drugs to AIDS victims are illegal cases of patent-infringement under the World Trade Organization's current IPR rules (known as "TRIPs.") The US is advocating even more stringent "TRIPs-plus" standards in the FTAA.

Just yesterday, pharmaceutical companies dropped their patent-infringement case against South Africa. "This is a huge victory for the poor people of South Africa. Now they have a chance to survive this disease," says Severina Rivera, an attorney with Oxfam America, which is partnering with Medicines Sans Frontieres and the South African TRIPs Action Coalition on this case. "Our next campaign is to get the US to drop its case against Brazil's AIDs-drugs policies in the WTO. "

"It is not appropriate to treat health care as a matter of commerce only," says Rob Weissman of the Consumer Project on Technology based in Washington DC. "Countries should have discretion to use compulsory licenses to achieve public interest goals. This is particularly important in complex fields of technology, where inventions are essential inputs for other inventions."

The FTAA position on IPRs falls within an intense international debate over patents. Last August, the United Nations Sub-Commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights has passed a resolution suggesting IPR conflict with the right of everyone to enjoy scientific progress, the right to health, the right to food and the right to self-determination. The World Trade Organization (WTO) is now actively debating a proposal from African nations to prohibit patents on all forms of life. A few governments and many non-governmental organizations have suggested that perhaps intellectual property rights should be deleted from the WTO's body of law or, indeed, from any trade agreement including the FTAA.

"Plant patents are encouraging biopiracy and the spread of genetically

engineered organisms," says Maria Isabel Manzur of the Fundacion Sociedades Sustentables in Chile. "First they come to our countries to take useful plants back to the laboratory, then they patent them and sell them back to us. We know that the only goal of commercial interests is to create an absolute dependency, obligating farmers to buy seeds every year. And the new genetically engineered varieties can be even more dangerous than toxic or nuclear wastes, because they can reproduce themselves and spread uncontrollably throughout an ecosystem."

"We are concerned that stronger, deeper patent protections for corporations will create even greater patent injustice," says Severina Rivera of Oxfam America, which has declared its opposition to the FTAA as a whole. "We believe that rules on intellectual property must strike a balance between rewarding private innovation and promoting broader social objectives. Where interests conflict, such rules must favor vital social objectives over the rights of patent holders."

Contrary to the principle that patents are necessary to promote innovation, most innovators are salaried employees of corporations or other major institutions; they are often constrained from sharing their research in order to ensure the eventual monopoly rights accrue to their institution and none other. "The genetic code is the sum of life's evolution on earth and should not become private property," says Laurel Hopwood of the Sierra Club.

"No individual, institution or corporation should have the ability to claim ownership over species or varieties of living organisms." The Sierra Club has also declared, "We hold that respect for this natural treasure demands that no government should have power to grant patents or property rights over it. Just as civilized societies have decided that there can be no ownership of human beings (slaves), we believe that there should be no ownership of the genetic code, which should continue to be the shared common heritage of all."

Aware of popular opposition to patents on life, numerous governments are attempting to legislate protections for genetic resources that stop short of actual patents. The WTO TRIPs Agreement allows for IPR-based alternatives to actual patents under the "sui generis" clause. The Convention on Biological Diversity, signed by 180 countries, stipulates that intellectual property rights "must be supportive or and not counter to" the goals of conservation, sustainable use and the equitable sharing of any benefits derived from biodiversity. The Andean Community recently stipulated that when a patent is granted for inventions based on the biological or genetic heritage or knowledge of local communities, the patent 'shall be subordinated' to the acquisition of that material in accordance with international, Andean Community and national law.

In keeping with these mandates, considerable effort has been directed to codifying the rights of Indigenous Peoples, Farmers' Rights, and other community rights at every level of government in ways that are nonetheless consistent with the powerful WTO. "In all of these debates," says Alberto Villareal of REDES - Friends of the Earth Uruguay, " it is important to realize there are a range of opinions - from those who support 'sui generis' regimes to those of us who object on grounds that they all interfere with the free exchange of germplasm, which is ultimately essential to the sustainability of biodiversity and food security."

A critique of the US negotiating position for the FTAA is highlighted in "America's Plan for the Americas" published by the Alliance for Responsible Trade (ART). Specifically, the US will not have to revise its national laws, already highly protective of monopolistic industries, but argues others

must. For example, on:

• Patents - Other governments' rights to refuse patents for plant varieties and/or humans and animals or to revoke such patents, as is available in TRIPs, would be eliminated. Other governments would have to limit their use of compulsory licensing to the terms of TRIPs and strictly limit the use of patented products or processes by competitors to marketing approvals only.

• Trade Secrets - Other governments would be required to prohibit companies from developing generic versions of products for at least five years after the initial product enters the market. If marketing approvals are delayed, governments would have to compensate patent holders with longer patents.
• Enforcement - Other governments would be expected to "significantly bolster" their enforcement capacity with regard to protecting patents, allowing full compensation for patent holders' claims and to take criminal action while exercising authority to seize pirated or counterfeit goods.

• Copyright - Other governments would have to strengthen protections for on-line and Internet exclusivity.
• Trademarks and Geographical Indications - Symbols of geographical indication would have to be considered trademarks, and restricted as such.

And other governments would be expected to set up procedures enabling

applicants to file simultaneously in multiple countries, and not to require license registration.

The Alliance for Responsible Trade is releasing the most recent version of its "Alternatives for the Americas" document, including a detailed proposal for a fair and just regime to protect peoples' intellectual rights, in

Quebec City this week.

For more information, please call:

Alberto Villareal, REDES-Friends of the Earth Uruguay, in Quebec:

418-872-1488.

Kristin Dawkins, Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy, in Quebec:

612-849-0889.

Rob Weissman, Consumer Project on Technology, in Washington DC:

202-387-8030.

Maria Isabel Manzur, Fundacion Sociedades Sustentables, in Santiago: 56-2 209-7028.

Severina Rivera, Esq., Oxfam America, in Quebec: 418-523-3186. For copies of Oxfam America's study "Cut the Cost Patent Injustice: How World Trade Rules Threaten the Health of the People" call

202-462-3836 in Washington, D.C.

Laurel Hopwood, Sierra Club, in Ohio, 216-371-9779.

Tom Hanson, Alliance for Responsible Trade, in Quebec: 312-925-7236.