Sceptics delay proposal for more WTO documents to be made public

See also
WTO reform: 39 members call for more information to be made public
How wide should the WTO window be set? 2 External transparency

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By Peter Ungphakorn
POSTED DECEMBER 15, 2023 | UPDATED DECEMBER 15, 2023

India, China and Antigua and Barbuda told the last meeting of the year of the World Trade Organization’s General Council on December 14, 2023, that they needed more time to discuss a proposal for more public transparency with WTO documents, effectively kicking the issue down the road.

The proposal has been resubmitted adding the US as a new sponsor — the US was already calling for meeting agendas to be made public as long ago as July 1998. (The updated text is below. The original version is from July.)

The 39 sponsors — Australia, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Costa Rica, the EU (and its 27 members), New Zealand, Norway, Switzerland, Taiwan, the UK and the US — want many important documents to be released to the public immediately, or faster than at present, some of them currently never made public.

We see no compelling reason why these must be kept restricted as they are formal statements explaining the state of our work
— the proposal’s sponsors, comment A2

They include meeting agendas and notes added to the agenda headings, and a wide range of reports by the WTO Secretariat — “We see no reason why [normal] official documents prepared by the Secretariat should ever be restricted”.

They also include documents that a member may want to be released related to its own individual commitments to open up their markets, currently always secret. These are officially called “schedules” of commitments.

WTO reform: 39 members call for more information to be made public

By Peter Ungphakorn
POSTED JULY 31, 2023 | UPDATED DECEMBER 15, 2023

The last General Council meeting before the 2023 summer break at the World Trade Organization (WTO), on July 24 and 25, received several documents on WTO reform. Some of them deal with public information and transparency — including making more documents available to the public, and quicker — and deserve more attention.

(Jump to the section on the proposal about derestricting documents, including the full text)

Why is this important? Here’s an example.

One of the most recent developments in the WTO is agreement on an almost-final text among participants negotiating new rules on investment. The deal would streamline investment procedures for the benefit of developing countries — Investment Facilitation for Development.

Ask anyone involved or with privileged information and they will speak glowingly about how useful this is going to be, such as in this session of the WTO Public Forum on September 15, 2023, or this article by ex-WTO Deputy Director-General Alan Wolff.

But the world at large has to take their word for it because the text is still secret. Ask “Why is it secret?” and the answer is “because it’s not completely final”.

The world at large has to take their word for it because the text is still secret

UPDATES: expanding the WTO intellectual property waiver for COVID-19

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By Peter Ungphakorn
POSTED OCTOBER 4, 2022 | UPDATED AS INDICATED

The waiver on patent protection for COVID-19 vaccines was agreed at the WTO Ministerial Conference on June 17, 2022. The text with brief explanations is here. The waiver is not an obligation. Countries can choose to suspend certain patent rights if they want.

Much of the work after the Ministerial Conference results from a provision for WTO members to decide within six months (by December 17, 2022) whether or not to expand the waiver to include COVID-19 tests and treatments:

“No later than six months from the date of this Decision, Members will decide on its extension to cover the production and supply of COVID-19 diagnostics and therapeutics”

Background: The original (revised) proposal; the debate; the proposed compromise and analysis.

Updates on the latest developments will be added here, with links to new documents and news items. That will include any notifications from countries changing their laws to apply the waiver. So far there are none.

Key events

• October 31, 2023 — deadlock continues in the intellectual property council after an information session with stakeholders
• October 23–24, 2023 — discussed by capital-based senior officials: positions are unchanged
• March and May, 2023 — discussed in the General Council but no new deadline set
• December 20, 2022 — the General Council agrees on postponing the deadline with no date set, but to be reconsidered in the Spring
• December 19, 2022 — the General Council postpones a decision on postponing the deadline
• December 17, 2022 — deadline for expansion decision missed, so far no country has moved to use the vaccine patent waiver agreed in June
• December 16, 2022 — formal meeting: chair’s draft binned, replaced by short paragraph postponing the deadline
• December 7, 2022 — chair’s draft factual report circulated
• December 6, 2022 — informal meeting discusses proponents’ draft and postponing deadline
• December 5–6, 2022 — US announces it will need time to consult stakeholders
• November 2, 2022 — informal meeting, with members’ positions on expanding the waiver to tests and treatments crystallised into three groups
• July 6, 2022 — first meeting after the vaccine patent waiver decision, followed by stock-taking and informal meetings

(TRIPS = trade-related aspects of intellectual property rights, the official description of intellectual property issues that are discussed in the WTO — they should be “trade-related” issues)