Trademarks

Panama Pushes to Expand Legal Protection for Regional Products at WIPO Assemblies

By De Puy & Asociados

Panama's Ministry of Commerce and Industries (MICI) used the 68th session of the World Intellectual Property Organization's (WIPO) Assemblies, held in Geneva from July 7 to 15, to advance cooperation on geographical indications, a legal mechanism that links a product's identity and reputation to its specific place of origin. The Panamanian delegation, led by Ambassador Alfredo Suescum, Panama's representative to the World Trade Organization and WIPO, along with Leonardo Uribe, director general of the Directorate General of the Industrial Property Registry (DIGERPI), held a series of meetings with WIPO officials during the assemblies, which bring together representatives of the organization's 194 member states.

Among those meetings, the delegation met with Wang Binying, WIPO's deputy director general for the Brands and Designs Sector, to discuss a technical assistance project focused on developing geographical indications in Panama. According to MICI, this tool is intended to help protect products whose qualities are tied to their geographic origin and to strengthen their added value in domestic and export markets. Panamanian representatives also met separately with WIPO's Patents and Technology Division to explore mechanisms for technical cooperation aimed at strengthening national capacities in innovation and technology transfer.

Geographical indications operate under Panama's Law 35 of May 10, 1996, on industrial property, later modified by Law 61 of October 5, 2012, which also governs patents, trademarks, industrial designs and trade secrets. Under this framework, a product may qualify for geographical indication or denomination of origin status when a specific quality, reputation or other characteristic is fundamentally attributable to its place of production. Applications are filed with DIGERPI and require a technical study demonstrating that link, along with a proposed regulation for the use and control of the designation.

The country's most established example of this protection is Café de Boquete, a coffee grown in the highlands of Chiriquí province, which received a denomination of origin from DIGERPI in 2013 following an application by the Association of High-Quality Coffee Producers of Boquete (APACAB). The designation formalized the traceability requirements associated with free trade agreements and has since accompanied the international rise of coffee from the region, including the Geisha variety, which has repeatedly set world records at specialty coffee auctions. Other collective marks registered in the same period include Café de Palmira and Piña de La Chorrera, alongside Kalu Dugbis, a guarantee mark protecting molas, the textile art form produced by the Guna people.

Alongside the technical meetings in Geneva, Panama took part in a joint pavilion with member countries of the Ministerial Forum on Intellectual Property for Central America and the Dominican Republic (PICARD), displaying molas, hand-painted hats, artisanal jewelry, spices and Panamanian rum to delegations from other participating states. The Panamanian delegation also met with El Salvador's Minister of Economy, María Luisa Hayem, to follow up on commitments made under the PICARD forum, a regional platform through which Central American countries and the Dominican Republic coordinate intellectual property policy. The Geneva program included a performance by Panama's National Folkloric Dance Company, presented alongside the pavilion exhibit.

MICI stated that Panama's participation in the WIPO Assemblies forms part of a broader effort to use intellectual property tools to protect cultural expressions and improve the international recognition and competitiveness of Panamanian products. The ministry's geographical indications work is carried out through DIGERPI, in coordination with the National Copyright Directorate (DNDA) of the Ministry of Culture, which oversees protections related to traditional and artisanal production.