The Nagoya Protocol on Access to Genetic Resources and the Fair and Equitable Sharing of Benefits Arising, adopted on 29 October 2010 and the Convention of Biological Diversity (CBD), both have implications for the WHO intergovernmental dialogue on influenza preparedness and virus sharing. Article 8 requires countries to ‘pay due regard’ to ‘cases of present or imminent emergencies that threaten or damage human, animal or plan health’. Article 4 calls for ‘due regard’ to be paid to ongoing work or practices, provided such work or practices are supportive of and do not run counter to the objectives of the Convention of Biological Diversity (CBD) and the Protocol. The CBD and protocol are important as they have a legally binding status as they are treaties. Notably the United States is not party to the CBD.
Health equity in economic and trade policies
South Africa is set to launch its own development aid agency in 2011. The South African Development Partnership Agency is expected to become operational before mid-2011 and will work with other external funding agencies to coordinate development programmes, mainly on the African continent. Although the government is hoping for contributions from the private sector, most of the funding will come from public money, according to Ayanda Ntsaluba, Director-General of the Department of International Relations and Cooperation. Since 2001, the South African government has channelled its aid contributions through the African Renaissance Fund (ARF), which is administered by the department. Much of the assistance provided by the ARF has focused on conflict resolution and peacekeeping in various countries, including Mali, Zimbabwe, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of Congo. However, transparency and accountability was problematic and Ntsaluba conceded that the tracking of ARF funds had not been optimal. Although the mandate for the new agency was still in draft form, he said South Africa would continue providing assistance to countries recovering from conflict. He assured critics that the new agency would be set up as a separate institution, with the administrative capacity to track and oversee all the programmes it funded.
This article looks at the main challenges to European Union-Africa relations in light of the EU-Africa summit held in Tripoli, Libya from 29-30 November 2010. The Tripoli meeting marked the third Africa-EU Summit since 2000. In 2007, both parties to the JAES pledged to work together to implement the Africa Health Strategy, the EU Project on Human Resources for Health, the Abuja commitment to dedicate 15% of government financing for health, and the European Programme for Action to Tackle the Shortage of Health Workers in Developing Countries. President Jacob Zuma of South Africa openly expressed his concern that after ten years of the partnership, there was still too little to show in terms of tangible implementation of the undertakings made in previous summits. He cautioned the summit against committing to another action plan when commitments made in the past have not been implemented. The author noted that for example the ongoing Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) negotiations, have become a contentious issue in EU-Africa relations, with clauses for example that may negatively impact on the production of affordable generic medicines for developing countries by rigorously protecting patent holders in developed countries.
At the World Health Organization (WHO) Executive Board meeting, held from 17-25 January 2011, members raised strong concerns that a working group they mandated last May to address problems with WHO policy on counterfeit and substandard medicines has yet to be formed – with only four months remaining before it must report back to members. The Indian delegation called for a halt to WHO activities on anti-counterfeiting until the outcome of the working group is accepted by member states. Members agreed falsified medicines were a threat for global public health but some delegates argued the solution cannot be dominated by intellectual property rights enforcement concerns. The Indian delegate said that the working group was supposed to investigate the International Medical Products Anti-Counterfeiting Taskforce (IMPACT). IMPACT is a project with international police agency Interpol and other agencies, housed within WHO, and is meant to ‘halt the production, trading and selling of fake medicines around the globe’. It has been criticised in the past by some countries who claim IMPACT has not helped clarify the confusion between substandard, falsified or unsafe drugs and legal, reliable generic medicines.
African countries have stalled on signing economic partnership agreements (EPAs) with the European Commission because they fear negative consequences for their smaller economies, this article reports. To avoid the pitfalls of signing the EPAs in their current form, the article suggests African countries should negotiate trade preferences. The author notes that the 33 least-developed countries (LDCs) in the African Union do not have to sign the EPAs since their trade preferences will continue under the ‘Everything But Arms’ scheme. They should not have to sign EPAs in order to maintain the common external tariffs they have or would like to have with the non-LDCs in their regional economic groupings. Instead, the 14 non-LDCs can request that the EU provide them also with the ‘Everything But Arms’ scheme, without their having to give preferences to the EU in return. He argues that there is a good case for this, as these 14 countries are also poor and vulnerable, and have similar characteristics as the LDCs. Moreover, they belong to regional economic groupings in which LDCs are the majority of the membership, and there is thus also a good case that they be given a similar status as the LDCs so that these groupings can continue with their common tariffs, without the LDCs having to be sacrificed. There are a number of cases in the WTO in which waivers have been given for non-reciprocal agreements between a developed country member and a developing country or region. The article concludes that the best option to resolve the EPA impasse is for Europe to give a non-reciprocal preferential package for Africa as a region, or for the 14 African non-LDCs, in a treatment similar to ‘Everything But Arms’.
This article is concerned with the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA), an international agreement that seeks to strengthen the power of enforcement agencies, such as customs, to seize products that are fakes and infringe intellectual property rights (IPRs). It would allow customs officials to seize products – including generic medicines - if they believe these are counterfeit. The problem with this, the author argues, is the presumption that customs officials are competent to make such technical judgments, when they are not. These agencies could thus be used by rights holders to launch action against exporters from the developing world in a move that could destroy their business. Initiating proceedings places exporters in a tough financial position even if the goods turn out to be bona fide, as they would have to pay exorbitant legal fees to fight in court. Although ACTA is being presented as an anti-counterfeiting measure, it really has very little to do with controlling the international trade in counterfeit goods, the author argues, whose value has been exaggerated by its proponents. Rather, the effort is to bring about a fundamental shift in the rules governing international trade in a wide variety of knowledge goods - counterfeit or not. For India and the developing world, a primary concern is generic drugs. The article points to the fact that ACTA does not include any due processes, and encourages award of significant damages based on the suggested retail price, which makes valuations and lost profit presumptions in favour of the rights holders. It also extends injunctions to third parties not directly accused as infringers of IPRs.
According to this article, the developing countries of the South should seek to establish trade and financial arrangements between themselves. Instead of seeking alliances with the United States or China, they could construct regional arrangements independently from the rules governing the global system. In this way, the economies of emerging countries will not have to be contingent on the problems experienced by the economies of these superpowers. A regional currency basket is also proposed, to build local capacity and independence. These various arrangements in different parts of the South could eventually be inter-related at the level of a global South. The article points to the failure of the G20 to reach consensus on a number of issues, including trading in health services, as indication that there is no possible global consensus. The author suggests that the way forward for countries of the South is to take independent initiatives among themselves.
Based on the outcome of a meeting that took place from 22-26 November in Switzerland, the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) has initiated an intellectual property (IP) project aimed at developing countries. The New Platform for Technology Transfer and IP Collaboration addresses WIPO Development Agenda recommendations 19, 25, 26 and 28 regarding developing countries. These recommendations require WIPO to facilitate access to knowledge and technology for developing countries and least-developed countries, to promote the transfer and dissemination of technology to benefit developing countries, and to foster research co-operation between developed and developing countries. The project consists of five phases: the organisation of five regional technology transfer consultation meetings, the commissioning of peer-reviewed analytic studies, the organisation of a High-Level International Expert Forum, the creation of a web forum on technology transfer and IP, and ‘the incorporation of any adopted set of recommendations resulting from the above activities into the WIPO programmes’.
This report includes the draft version of the Joint Africa-Europe Strategy (JAES) Action Plan 2011-2013 for the Partnership on the Millennium Development Goals (MDG), which commits the European Community and African Union (AU) partnership to several health actions and goals, focused on implementing the Campaign for Accelerated Reduction of Maternal Mortality in Africa (CARMMA), increasing human resources for health in Africa and ensuring that governments meet their Abuja commitment to allocate 15% of spending on health. Certain goals are provided. By 2013, CARMMA must have been launched in all 53 AU Members States and its strategy implemented in at least 25 Members States. By 2013, more AU Member States should have improved access to HIV and AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria services by implementing the ‘Abuja Call’ with its new set indicators aligned with those of MDG 6. Finally, by 2013, more Member States must have strengthened their health systems through improved human resources for health strategies.
This resolution was adopted by the African Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) Council of Ministers during their meeting in Brussels on 8-10 November 2010. It makes no explicit references to health, but the inclusion of health may be inferred by references to the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), food insecurity and development aid. The Council re-affirmed the need to develop objective criteria that will be used to determine the parameters to enable the conclusion and implementation of the economic partnership agreements (EPAs). These criteria may be linked to a number of areas, including the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), agricultural production, and the level of official development aid. The Council calls on the European Union to demonstrate maximum flexibility on all the outstanding contentious issues, with a view to resolving them and thereby affording the ACP States and regions the opportunity to grow economically, particularly in the context of south-south trade, and allow for maximum use of policy space for development purposes. The Council requests that the EU include a specific safeguard clause for agriculture in the framework of the EPAs while maintaining the possibility of resorting to the Special Safeguard Mechanism during WTO negotiations, to help protect small farmers and maintain food security in the ACP regions.