INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY:TECHNICAL COOPERATION — KEY DOCUMENTS
VIII. TRIPS and Trade Policy Reviews, Accessions and Regional Trade Agreements
Technical Cooperation
Key documents
I. TRIPS Legal texts and the relevant Conventions
II. The Doha Development Agenda
III. TRIPS and Public Health
IV. Review of TRIPS Article 27.3(b); Relationship Between the TRIPS Agreement and the Convention on Biological Diversity; Protection of Traditional Knowledge and Folklore
V. Geographical Indications
VI. Dispute Settlement
VII. Least Developed Country Members
VIII. TRIPS and Trade Policy Reviews, Accessions and Regional Trade Agreements
IX. Other Issues: TRIPS and e-Commerce, and TRIPS and Climate
X. TRIPS Implementation: notifications and reviews
1. National IP Policies — Trade Policy Reviews
The WTO undertakes regular reviews of the trade policies of all WTO Members. These 'Trade Policy Reviews' produce detailed information on national IP-related policies of all Members. The trade policy review reports prepared by the Secretariat for each country in the series WT/TPR/S cover IP policy in Chapter III. These reports are available here.
2. WTO Accessions
All accession Working Party Reports of Members having negotiated their WTO accession under Article XII of the Marrakesh Agreement include a descriptive section on the TRIPS Regime. These Members have undertaken specific TRIPS-related commitments, as reflected in their Reports, which form part of their WTO Membership obligations. The specific TRIPS-related commitment paragraphs, as well as the full text of the Working Party Reports, can be retrieved from the Accession Commitments Database (ACDB).This database covers all accession commitments and related information provided in the Working Party Reports and Accession Protocols of those Members having acceded to the WTO, pursuant to Article XII of the Marrakesh Agreement. The database can be accessed at http://acdb.wto.org/.
In addition, a summary analysis of the TRIPS-related commitments undertaken by Article XII WTO Members since 1995 is available in Chapter 5 of the Handbook on Accession to the WTO.
Detailed information on the implementation of the TRIPS Agreement is also provided by acceding governments during the accession process in a questionnaire format. The layout of this questionnaire is contained in document WT/ACC/9 and WT/ACC/9/Corr.1 — Technical note on the Accession Process — Information to be Provided on Implementation of the TRIPS Agreement. All accession documents, including the TRIPS questionnaires, are derestricted once accession negotiations are concluded with the adoption of the Working Party Report.
3. Regional Trade Agreements (RTAs)
A number of regional trade agreements contain IP-related provisions. The full list of RTAs notified to the WTO can be found iin the RTA database at http://rtais.wto.org.