[p2p-research] Open patents for development

[Liam Rattray]

Intellectual property rights conflict between the 2/3rds world (China,
India, Indonesia, the interests of deprived everywhere, etc) and core
hyper-industrialized governments (Brown and Obama administrations et
al.) through the World Trade Organization's (WTO) Trade Related
aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPs) Agreement, an
international treaty, have focused on many technologies including
low-carbon tech. Most contentious are pharmaceuticals. The TRIPs
agreement only provides for compulsory licensing, or state-mandated
licensing, of drugs for generic low-cost production in cases of
"emergency." Thailand has used compulsory licenses to do just this for
HIV/AIDs drugs. G77+China is negotiating to extend this compulsory
licensing to climate technologies because, for the 2/3rds world,
climate change is an emergency.

Don't blame the oppressed for the wrong-doings of the powerful.
Developing nations don't have much room for negotiating and if they
have to choose between no financing for climate change adaptation and
neo-imperial financing for climate change mitigation and adaptation
then they will clearly choose the later. An Open Development Fund
provides an alternative that doesn't directly destroy the neo-imperial
nature of the flexible mechanism and intellectual property regimes
imposed on developing countries and does create the possibility for
funds to be used to actually benefit the 2/3rds world. Because it
doesn't pose a direct threat to the hegemony of the core
government-corporate complex it is possible that the Open Development
Fund proposal could be ratified by the Parties of the UNFCCC. If not,
then I'll call up George Soros and start a non-profit.

In solidarity,
Liam Rattray
http://opendevelopmentfund.wordpress.com