Venezuela highlights its re-energized international insertion during WIPO meeting

By E.C.V. & ASOCIADOS

The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Group of Latin American and Caribbean Countries (GRULAC) met with Director General Daren Tang with the aim of publicizing the region’s IP agencies strategies for 2022 and 2023.

Among the assistants was Orlando Salazar, Foreign Affairs director of Venezuela’s IP Office (SAPI). "In a scenario as important as this, we mention the progress we have had during the last two years in Venezuela’s international insertion and adoption of intellectual property and commerce related treaties,” Salazar specified.

Among those progresses discussed with Tang was SAPI’s October 2020 announcement of Venezuela’s direct application of the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS).

TRIPS is the most comprehensive multilateral agreement on IP as it plays a central role in facilitating trade in knowledge and creativity, in resolving trade disputes over IP, and in assuring World Trade Organization (WTO) members the latitude to achieve their domestic policy objectives. It frames the IP system in terms of innovation, technology transfer and public welfare. The agreement is a legal recognition of the significance of links between IP and trade and the need for a balanced IP system.
GRULAC countries also reiterated to Tang that the measures adopted by its members to contain the COVID‑ 19 pandemic had significantly affected their economies and had exacerbated the structural problems facing the region, exposing their vulnerabilities and imposing new challenges.

As IP plays a fundamental role in the economic growth of the group’s countries by promoting innovation and knowledge‑ based industries -contributing to a more meaningful participation of countries in global value chains- GRULAC expects the strengthening of technical assistance, cooperation, and technical capacity building, provided by the organization through an innovative, dynamic agenda that allows the region to use IP as a tool for growth and innovation.

In particular, GRULAC said that it would like to see enhanced cooperation in the area of copyright, which was particularly important for Latin America and the Caribbean, given the importance and potential of this industry in the region.