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INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY: WIPO-WTO COLLOQUIUM FOR IP TEACHERS

Statements from the directors-general and directors

From the WIPO and WTO directors-general

The WIPO-WTO Colloquium for Teachers of Intellectual Property has played a central role in the joint capacity building programmes of WIPO and the WTO. This cooperation seeks to enrich dialogue on IP issues and to address the developmental and wider policy considerations that form an integral part of IP law and policy today. The Colloquium responds to the recognition that developmental benefits from the IP system can only be reaped through skilled adaptation to national circumstances and judicious use by informed practitioners..

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 Photo credit (WIPO): Dhillon Photographics

 


WIPO Director-General Francis Gurry

WTO Director-General Roberto Azevêdo

Equally, effective policy development at the national level needs increasingly to draw upon skilled, informed and sophisticated policy analysis. The Colloquium bolsters the capacity of those best placed to ensure truly sustainable, long-term benefits from the adept use of the IP system – those who teach the IP practitioners of the future, and those who conduct research on IP law and policy.

In today's changing global economy, IP significantly influences the everyday lives of all citizens around the world. An international IP system that can adjust to the shifting global economic landscape, while also stimulating innovation and furthering development, demands the understanding, participation and cooperation of all peoples across the societal spectrum. Initiatives such as the Colloquium play an important role in building capacity, raising awareness, and engaging all societies that are affected by the evolution of the international IP system.

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From the Directors of the WTO IP Division and WIPO Academy


WTO IP Division Director Antony Taubman

WIPO Academy Executive Director Mr. Sherif Saadallah

The Colloquium has exemplified and promoted current trends in technical assistance and capacity building: it builds upon and extends an existing partnership between WIPO and the WTO; it responds to the need for stronger, broader dialogue and a greater involvement of voices from all perspectives in contemporary debates; it recognizes the central role of indigenous capacity building and of the key contribution of IP teachers and researchers as the mainstay of sustainable development of the necessary IP expertise in developing countries; it transcends traditional boundaries between regions and between 'north' and 'south' to allow fruitful discourse on the viii future of IP systems. Most importantly, it recognizes the importance of extending beyond an educational function to one of bringing together a diverse group with the aim of reviving and refreshing dialogues on IP and its cognate fields.

WIPO and the WTO both host numerous meetings every year, in Geneva and in many locations elsewhere, and under numerous headings: committees, seminars, workshops, roundtables, symposia, and so on. But amidst all this activity, the idea of a 'colloquium' has a special ring to it – for the WIPO-WTO Colloquium, it connotes a spirit of academic enquiry, a search for new ideas and new ways of analysing IP and related fields, through open debate, rigorous research, and new ways of communicating the complexities of IP law, practice and policy.