We have been reporting for almost two years, and 20 days negotiation, on a development agenda for WIPO. With no agreement on the 111 proposals, member states were sent back to the negotiating table once more to hammer out an agreement. The first meeting took place in February to discuss the “low hanging fruit” i.e. less contentious proposals.

Progress was made! After five days, the proposals were accepted, including items of importance to eIFL, on the public domain and control of anti-competitive practices. These came under pressure from some countries, especially Colombia, which attempted to spoil the occasion by recording a formal objection in the final agreement. However, as a senior member of the US delegation said, “We sensed a different atmosphere on both sides this time”.

Much credit to the spirit of cooperation goes to the new chairman, the Ambassador of Barbados to the UN, who displayed the qualities of a true diplomat: a determination to get the sides talking to each other, a tough, business-like approach to negotiations coupled with a great sense of humour.

Iryna Kuchma from Ukraine joined the eIFL team, delivering the first ever library intervention in Russian. This was a pleasant surprise for the Russian-speaking delegates who rarely hear NGO interventions in Russian, and enabled eIFL to reach out to government representatives from this part of the world.

The next meeting in June will seal the fate of the development agenda. This will be much tougher, however, because the rest of the proposals are more contentious and many are opposed by the industrialised countries. But the upbeat conclusion of the February meeting gave everyone a sense of optimism for June.

“As [the Indian] delegation, we feel it is a very significant forward movement. The meeting concluded in a spirit of compromise and consensus. This augurs well for future deliberation which may lead to the finalisation of a development agenda for WIPO. It is imperative that member states maintain this spirit in the next meeting of the PCDA”.