Bridges Weekly Trade News Digest • Volume 9 • Number 15 • 4th May 2005
WIPO Development Agenda Debate Continues At Seminar
KEMAL DERVIS NOMINATED TO HEAD UNDP
UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan has nominated Kemal Dervis, a former Finance Minister of Turkey, to lead the UN Development Programme (UNDP). If the UN General Assembly confirms the 26 April nomination, it will be the first time the administrator of the UN’s largest independently-funded agency has been chosen from outside the major donor nations.
Dervis, a 56-year old Member of the Turkish Parliament, was a World Bank official for 22 years and Turkey’s Finance Minister between March 2001 and August 2002. During that time, he was credited with leading his country out of a major economic crisis. He will succeed Mark Malloch Brown, who has been appointed the Secretary-General’s chief of staff. Before Malloch Brown, a Briton, the previous five UNDP heads had been American.
Annan said Dervis, a widely published economist and expert on global economic governance, had a "passionate commitment to addressing the scourge of poverty." He will be expected to champion the UN’s Millennium Development Goals and to manage an annual budget of over USD 3 billion.
Dervis is expected to take office before the annual meeting of the General Assembly in September.
ICTSD Reporting; "UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan nominates former Turkish Finance Minister Kemal Dervis to head UNDP", UNDP NEWS RELEASE, 26 April 2005; "UN Post For Turkish Ex-Minister", BBC NEWS ONLINE 27 April 2005.
Representatives from governments, non-governmental organizations and the private sector met at the World Intellectual Property Office (WIPO) on 2-3 May to discuss the relationship between intellectual property (IP) issues and development.
WIPO co-organised the International Seminar on Intellectual Property and Development with the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), the World Health Organization (WHO), the UN Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), and the WTO in order to provide an international forum on IP open to all. The seminar heard presentations on subjects such as public health, biodiversity and traditional knowledge, copyright and related rights in the digital environment, competition policy, and creating value from intellectual property. Furthermore, the Seminar expanded on several countries’ national experiences with their respective IP laws.
The seminar was one of a number of official responses taken during the last WIPO General Assembly as a reaction to a September 2004 proposal by fourteen developing countries (WO/GA/31/11) for the ‘Establishment of a Development Agenda for WIPO’ (see BRIDGES Weekly, 8 September 2004). An ‘inter-sessional inter-governmental meeting’ (IIM) also on the subject was held on 11-13 April, and two further meetings are to be held before the end of July 2005 (see BRIDGES Weekly, 13 April 2005).
The program for the International Seminar is available at http://www.wipo.int/meetings/2005/isipd/en/.
ICTSD reporting.