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Peter Ungphakorn Profile picture
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Feb 24 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was raised on Day 2 of the WTO General Council today

A number of countries prefaced their statements under various agenda items by expressing concern about violation of sovereignty, territoriality and the rule of law

1/4
WTO spokesman Keith Rockwell said they included Australia, Canada, Colombia, EU, Georgia, Japan, Rep. Korea, Mexico, Norway, New Zealand, UK, US

Russia said the WTO was not the place to discuss this

2/4 docs.wto.org/dol2fe/Pages/S…
On the deadlocked #TRIPSWaiver⬇️, more countries expressed concern about the attempt to break the deadlock among 4 key players: India, EU, SAfrica and US—mainly a complaint that they were not being informed about what was happening in the small group.

3/4
Added to 🇨🇭, 🇬🇧 were eg, Indonesia, Japan and Russia.

The main reason why this was on the General Council agenda was the 90-day rule for discussing waivers (WTO Agreement Art9.3)⬇️. The General Council can act on behalf of the Ministerial Conference

4/4

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Peter Ungphakorn Profile picture
Feb 22
A formal meeting of the WTO intellectual property (TRIPS) council this afternoon heard reports from an attempt by four members (EU, India, SAfrica, US) to break the deadlock over waiving the obligation to protect some intellectual property for COVID-19 (the #TRIPSwaiver)

1/10
WTO deputy head @_AnabelG who is coordinating (with DG @NOIweala) with the group of 4 said the talks have been difficult but she hoped a compromise could be possible.

One approach explored is to separate vaccines from diagnostics and therapeutics. (Why? Explained in 9/10)

2/10
The EU—said it was looking for a bridge between waiver-advocates and its own position to make flexibilities in WTO rules as easy to use.

The US—repeated its broad support for the waiver (but so far with no specifics), and that it is working with members to find a solution

3/10
Read 10 tweets
Peter Ungphakorn Profile picture
Feb 22
Proposed rescheduled in-person WTO Ministerial Conference—June 2–4 or week of June 13, Geneva.

General Council chair Dacio Castillo the earliest feasible dates taking account of availability of Swiss security and other facilities.

1/6 wto.org/english/thewto…
Based on what he heard informally today, Castillo will consult members and report to the formal General Council tomorrow & Thursday.

Most delegations preferred the week of Jun 13, some preferred Jun 2–4, but most said they were flexible, according to a Geneva trade official

2/6
The new dates are possible because Switzerland eased most of its COVID-19 restrictions on Feb 17. The Swiss ambassador told the meeting that most restrictions on entry would be lifted. Any remaining curbs will be waived for the Ministerial Conference.

3/6 swissinfo.ch/eng/covid-19_c…
Read 7 tweets
Peter Ungphakorn Profile picture
Feb 14
Very niche🧵

Who invented the 4 modes of services supply?

I took a deep dive into historical Uruguay Round negotiating documents following contributions from @ScheeleJonathan @AmyPorges @henrysgao @RMelendezOrtiz

Short answer: it was an evolution, crystallised by the EU

1/14
The four modes of services supply are:

1 cross border supply
2 consumption abroad
3 foreign commercial presence
4 movement or presence of natural persons

Within the 1986–94 Uruguay Round negotiations, this evolved from Feb 1987 to Oct 1989

2/14 wto.org/english/tratop… Image
Feb 23–25, 1987 meetings

The earliest reference to this idea is in summary note MTN.GNS/7
docs.wto.org/dol2fe/Pages/S…

This has (1) cross-border supply, (2) (partial) presence of natural persons, (3) commercial presence.

Not consumption abroad

3/14 Image
Read 17 tweets
Peter Ungphakorn Profile picture
Feb 10
This is an interesting WTO staff working paper by Ting-Wei (Alex) Chiang and Xiaoping Wu of the Intellectual Property Division

It's complicated, but that's the nature of #COVID19 vaccines and vaccine patents

Direct link to the paper: wto.org/english/res_e/…

Some takeaways

1/6
The paper looks at the different types of vaccine technology and their "patent families" (patent applications for the same or similar technical content), evolution, distribution of inventions and patents globally, types of companies involved, and more

2/6 wto.org/english/res_e/…
• Vaccine types vary in the number of patent families involved. Viral vector (AstraZeneca etc) and mRNA (Pfizer, Moderna, etc) have more

• Private firms dominate, SMEs contributing most, public labs do basic science research

• Earlier years count

3/6 wto.org/english/res_e/…
Read 6 tweets
Peter Ungphakorn Profile picture
Feb 3
The 🇪🇺 Commission says this is the first Sri Lankan 🇱🇰 geographical indication to be registered in the EU.

For those of us with long memories, it's more than that.

Back in 2005-2006 Sri Lanka complained its exports to the EU were blocked.

Details: spsims.wto.org/en/SpecificTra…

1/3
Sri Lanka raised this in the WTO committee on food safety and animal/plant health (SPS) in 2005–2006.

🇱🇰 complained that EU rules on sulphur dioxide were inconsistent ⬇️, preventing imports of its cinnamon.

The EU and @FAOWHOCodex were sympathetic.

2/3 wto.org/english/news_e… Image
By late 2006, the issue was resolved.

15 years later Sri Lanka has a protected geographical indication for its cinnamon in the EU

WTO processes may be slow, but sometimes they produce results.

3/3 wto.org/english/news_e… Image
Read 4 tweets
Peter Ungphakorn Profile picture
Jan 27
JOB/GC/281 is here tradebetablog.files.wordpress.com/2021/11/walker…

See 🧵⬇️

And …

1/2
… and an explanation is here.

2/2 tradebetablog.wordpress.com/2021/11/26/wto…
PS. Feb 28 deadline (good luck with that ambassador @CastilloDacio)

Read 4 tweets

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