Geneva and Swiss officials and representatives of member states of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) joined WIPO Director General Francis Gurry on November 7, 2008 at a ceremony marking the laying of the foundation stone of the new WIPO building project.
Some 200 participants, including government representatives from fifty nations, joined World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Director General Francis Gurry at a ceremony in Lisbon on October 31, 2008 marking the 50th anniversary of the adoption of an international agreement that facilitates the international protection of appellations of origin.
The European Commission (EC) and the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) launched on November 2, 2008, a project which aims to modernize the intellectual property (IP) system in Bangladesh and to help the country maximize the benefits of IP protection. The project is designed, through various capacity-building measures, to promote effective management of the intellectual property (IP) system, and its strategic use in supporting wealth creation and social and cultural development. It will address the challenges faced by Bangladesh in meeting its international obligations and will support the evolution of the national IP system in line with the country’s development objectives.
The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) and the National Institute of Industrial Property (INPI) of Portugal will mark the 50th anniversary of the adoption of the Lisbon Agreement for the Protection of Appellations of Origin and their International Registration at a Forum on Geographical Indications and Appellations of Origin to be held in Lisbon on October 30 and 31, 2008.
The Director General of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), Mr. Francis Gurry, and the Chairman of the Intergovernmental Committee on Intellectual Property and Genetic Resources, Traditional Knowledge and Folklore (IGC), Ambassador Rigoberto Gauto Vielman of Paraguay, said they would pursue efforts in the coming weeks to bridge differences among member states on the way to move international negotiations forward. The IGC wrapped up its 13th meeting late in the evening of October 17, 2008 after attempts to hammer out compromise texts on the future work program faltered. Despite intense negotiations, delegations were not able to agree on the working procedures required to deliver the concrete outcomes that many have called for from this Committee. The IGC’s mandate calls upon it to accelerate its work, and expectations remain strong that the Committee should produce a significant outcome by the time it is required to report back to the WIPO General Assembly in September 2009.
The Director General of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), Mr. Francis Gurry, called upon WIPO’s member states to intensify efforts to develop concrete international outcomes on traditional knowledge, traditional cultural expressions and genetic resources. This call opened the 13th session of the Intergovernmental Committee on Intellectual Property and Genetic Resources, Traditional Knowledge and Folklore (IGC), WIPO’s principal policy forum working on these issues, on October 13, 2008. Newly elected IGC Chairman, H.E. Ambassador Rigoberto Gauto Vielman of Paraguay, echoed the Director General’s call for the Committee to accelerate and focus its work with a view to delivering conclusive results.
The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) has added five new multilingual courses to the distance learning program offered by its Worldwide Academy. The new courses will cover Arbitration and Mediation Procedure, Patents, Patent Information Search, Basics of Patent Drafting, and Trademarks.
The Director General of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), Mr. Francis Gurry, and his counterpart from the African Regional Intellectual Property Organization (ARIPO), Mr. Gift H. Sibanda, signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) on October 2, 2008 in Geneva, to strengthen and expand cooperation between the two organizations. The MOU covers traditional areas of cooperation relating to capacity building, as well as a special project to boost ARIPO’s patent information capacity.
The Director General of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), Mr. Francis Gurry, welcomed the ratification by the United States of America (USA) on October 1, 2008 of the Singapore Treaty on the Law of Trademarks, an international treaty on trademarks that streamlines and modernizes certain trademark office procedures.
Topped by the appointment of Mr. Francis Gurry as the next Director General of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), the WIPO Assemblies concluded a day ahead of schedule, on Tuesday, September 29, 2008, following a review of activities over the past year and discussions on the Organization’s future work program. The WIPO Assemblies bring together the 184 member states of the Organization.