8:39 AM Oct 4, 1995

US REBUFFED ON HIVING OFF PART OF WIPO

Geneva 4 Oct (Chakravarthi Raghavan) -- The WIPO building premises in Geneva is to get a temporary extension for housing the expanding needs of its Patent Cooperation Treaty department, pending further study of needs and options for a permanent solutions.

These were among the several decisions taken at the meetings of the WIPO General Assembly and that of the coordinating bodies which concluded here Tuesday.

The permanent solutions and alternative building premises -- construction of a new building or use of the adjacent premises of the World Meterological Organization, which is to be acquired by WIPO when the WMO moves to a new premises -- are to be studied and presented by the WIPO international bureau.

But the debate on the PCT premises and relocation issue left little doubt that the US efforts to get the PCT relocated in San Francisco have been virtually rejected, having received the support of only three or four others, while the large majority of the membership opposed moves to shift the PCT department out of Geneva and the WIPO headquarters and/or to any fragmentation of the WIPO activities.

The International Bureau (Secretariat) of the WIPO had proposed a temporary extension of building premises at a cost of 4.226 million swiss francs, and a new building premises at a cost of 11 million.

The United States in its proposals sought further study of various options, including locating the money spinning PCT department in some other country, inviting various countries to offer to host the PCT department, and for itself offered San Francisco as a host site. The US argued that the long-term needs of the PCT for space mandated a move of the entire PCT operation and administration to a location outside of Geneva, where operational costs could be reduced.

In the debate on the issue, with over 40 countries participating, the US proposal was strongly opposed by a number of countries, developed and developing. Only Australia, New Zealand, United Kingdom and Canada, with some nuances supported study of various options for a new building, in or outside Geneva, and the idea of relocating the PCT department in some other country. About 4-5 did not comment.

Among those who spoke in favour of maintaining the unity of the WIPO administration of all the Unions and treaties, and opposed the US move to move the PCT activities elsewhere, away from the centralized WIPO activities in Geneva, were India, Hungary, Burkina Faso, Nigeria, France, Brazil, South africa, Cuba, Algeria, Germany, Peru, Egypt (for the Arab countries), China, Poland, Sweden, Switzerland, Sudan, Argentina, Italy, Benin, Portugal, Spain, Denmark, Kenya, Cote d'Ivoire, Colombia, Indonesia, Uruguay, Seneghal, Chad, Togo, and Cameroon.

Earlier intervening in the debate (where some speakers suggested that study of a split up of various departments and their locations elsewhere could be useful), Dr. Bogsch said it would be "dangerous even to speculate that the Organization could be split in two". Although the outcome of any such study would probably be to keep the Organization together, because of the great support for that, presenting a split-up as a possible solution was dangerous since it would have a terrible effect on morale of the personnel who would not know what their future would hold. It would also have a very bad psychological effect on the users of PCT, who had the experience that in Geneva there was a solid, well-run and stable organization. Users might have less confidence in the PCT if there were to be a new start for the PCT.

In interventions, the US insisted on need for study of all options, including locating the PCT department elsewhere than in Geneva strongly opposed even the temporary extension of premises and said it would disassociate itself from any consensus on this.

In another decision, the WIPO assembly agreed in principle to cooperation with the World Trade Organization and its Council on TRIPs, and asked that the Chair of the WIPO Coordination Committee, Eladio Loizaga of Paraguay, with the assistance of the WIPO's International bureau should continue informal consultations that have taken place between the Chair of the TRIPs Council and the WIPO Director-General.

Agreements on cooperation are to be referred to the WIPO Coordination Committee for approval, and to the WIPO General Assembly for review.

Among immediate cooperation activities to be undertaken are cooperation activities with developing countries over their various intellectual property legislations and bringing them into conformity with the TRIPs accord; for WIPO collection of laws and regulations to be extended to include laws and regulations covered by the TRIPs accord, expand the publication and explore possibilities of developing a computerized data base on these, explore with WTO possibilities for countries making a single notifications of national laws and assistance to the developing countries to have such laws translated into one of the official WTO languages, for access to WIPO data base on these to the WTO etc. Some of the terms and conditions, including cost sharing, are to be further explored in these talks.

But the WIPO Assemblies, have allocated six million swiss francs over the next biennium for these cooperation activities of the WIPO, and with the resources to come from the fees earned on the PCT activities.