3. International Trade Law Flexibilities and their Utilization in Africa
Thirty-nine African states are in the WTO. These states have the duty to comply with the WTO treaties, which among others includes the TRIPS Agreement. The Agreement requires states to respect the rights of patent holders over their products. Accordingly, only the patent owner has an exclusive right to make, use, to offer for sale, sell, or import the product. Nevertheless, amendments to the TRIPS Agreement issued exceptions that favor the public health needs of least developed countries. Among the thirty-nine WTO member states from Africa twenty-four are direct beneficiaries of these flexibilities as they are included in the Least Developed Country list of the UN. Four of the exceptions to the TRIPS Agreement and their use in Africa are discussed below.
3.1. Compulsory License
As per the main TRIPS Agreement the government of the country where the patent is registered was allowed to authorize the supply of the product only for domestic market without the consent of the patent owner. Amendment to the TRIPS agreement introduced the compulsory license exception, which allows countries to allow production and sale of patented pharmaceutical products to least developed countries, and to countries that requested the application of compulsory license exception, without the patent holder’s consent.
Utilization of compulsory license requires proper regulation and planning from governments of both
Some how They are above copy write and patent law; that states that an individual/company can hold exclusive rights for only three years to regain research and development costs and make some profit. This was established so companies/individuals could not establish a monopoly on a product/service letting them completely control the market price. This is some thing that in the rest of the civilized democratic countries is not allowed and drug are part of the free market system. An example of this would be in Canada the same U.S. Company sells its drugs cheaper to compete with prices in the open market and in the U.S. they charge more money because of their monopoly on the drug.
Economic: Globalization of the pharmaceutical industry is an exciting opportunity to have research and development done at cheaper prices in other countries. However, this could be a double edged sword for companies because it is easy for other countries, such as India, to produce generic versions of the drug in bulk.
“The right conferred by the patent grant is, in the language of the statute and of the grant itself, “the right to exclude others from making, using, offering for sale, or selling” the invention in the United States or “importing” the invention into the United States. What is granted is not the right to make, use, offer for sale, sell or import, but the right to exclude others from making, using, offering for sale, selling or importing the invention. Once a patent is issued, the patentee must enforce the patent without aid of the USPTO” (ALEXANDRIA 1).
Under TRIPS, until a pharmaceutical patent is actually granted, a country has no obligation to protect potential prospective rights (during the pendency of the
Pharmaceutical companies are often able to achieve temporary monopolies from patents granting them the exclusive right to produce and market drug formulations they have developed. These patents are:
Evidently, both the EU and the U.S. enacted special provisions legislative, which extended the pharmaceuticals patents' life. As is the case with America, the Waxman-Hatch Act increased the copyright protection based on name-brand drugs with up to five years, but still it also puts
In 1970 the government passed two new regulations that has effect on the pharmaceutical industry. “The India Patent Act prohibited
These are some of the reasons why the pharmaceutical companies think it is better to go out of the country so that they can make money there. In almost all the other countries of the world, the branded medicines are used
Large pharmaceutical companies spend millions of dollars and many years developing new and innovative medications. To protect their investment of time and money, they apply and are granted patents from the government, which gives the scientist and pharmaceutical companies a protected period of time that they can be assured that others will be prevented from selling their invention (Williams & Torrens, 2008). This protected period of time gives these companies a period of time that they can sell their new product at
With economic globalization, international trade is developing and growing at an unprecedented rate. After China joined the WTO, international trade tariffs reduced significantly;many non-tariff barriers were also reduced. However, some countries have adopted some new trade restrictions in order to protect their industries and markets. The ‘green barrier’ policy is a kind of trade protection means which has been frequently used by the developed countries since the 1990s, it has created unequal trade relations for a vast number of developing countries and caused huge economic losses to these developing countries. It has become the new obstacle for international trade. Briefly, the problems are: first, an increase in the cost of enterprises, affecting the international competitiveness of enterprises and second, the implementation of ‘green trade’ barriers hindering the development of the Chinese export trade. This essay will examine these problems in more detail and seek to offer possible solutions.
The World Trade Organization (WTO) is a global organization that helps countries and producers of goods deal fairly and smoothly with conducting their business across international borders. It mainly does this through WTO agreements, which are negotiated and signed by a large majority of the trading nations in the world. The purpose of the WTO is to ensure that global trade commences freely, smoothly and predictably while also aiming to create economic peace and stability in the world through a multilateral system. This is based and applied to member states, currently 162 countries, that have consented and ratified the rules of the WTO in their individual countries. Simply put, these documents act as contracts that provide the legal framework for conducting business among nations, integrating into a country 's domestic legal system, therefore, applying to local companies and nationals in the conduct of business internationally. For instance, if a company were to open an office or business in a foreign country, the rules of the WTO dictates how that can be done.1
Therefore, protection of patents is one of the key conditions necessary for further development of the pharmaceutical industry. At the same time, non-efficient legislation that does not provide the necessary level of patent protection is one of the factors that hamper expansion of “Big Pharmaceutical” companies to the developing countries8.
The concept of product patent for pharmaceutical products is likely to make life saving medicine beyond the reach of the poor and deprived section of the society around the world.
The World Trade Organization (“WTO”) Dispute Settlement System and the International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (“ICSID”) are two of the most widely used methods of international dispute settlement.
This essay is going to look at the principles governing trading between the WTO member states and their repercussions on human rights. This principles have a two way repercussion on human rights: on the one hand they tend to promote certain fundamental human rights; and on the other hand, they tend to undermine fundamental human rights. Article XX of the GATT is one good example. It empowers member states of the WTO to raise barriers to trade and discriminate against member states where such is necessary to protect human, animal or plant health. The state in however taking such a measure must do it in a manner that is as less trade-restrictive as possible. The essay will show how fundamental human rights such as the right to health is violated because a state is trying to adopt measures which are as less trade restrictive as possible.