WIPO has solicited input “from all relevant stakeholders regarding their experience and views on the impact, orientation, cost-efficiency, management and coordination of WIPO technical assistance over the past three years.”  The request for public input is part of an external review commissioned by WIPO as part of its work on the development agenda.  To participate in the review, please fill out the questionnaire posted on WIPO’s Development Agenda site and email it to  Carolyn Deere-Birkbeck and Santiago Roca by March 7. 

FROM THE WIPO WEBSITE:

External Review of WIPO Technical Assistance in the area of Cooperation for Development: Public Consultation

As part of the independent External Review of WIPO’s Technical Assistance in the Areas of Cooperation for Development, the consultants leading the Review request input from all relevant stakeholders regarding their experience and views on the impact, orientation, cost-efficiency, management and coordination of WIPO technical assistance over the past three years (2008-2010).

Background

With the adoption of the WIPO Development Agenda (DA) in October 2007, the WIPO General Assembly called upon “all Member States, the Secretariat and other relevant WIPO bodies to ensure the immediate and effective implementation” of the 19 DA Recommendations that were considered to be for immediate implementation.  The 2008 General Assembly extended this to all adopted Recommendations.

Subsequently, the Committee on Development and Intellectual Property (CDIP), at its 4th Session in Geneva, in November 2009, approved the “Project on Enhancement of WIPO’s Results-Based Management (RBM) Framework to Support the Monitoring and Evaluation of the Impact of the Organization’s Activities on Development”[1] which includes the implementation of DA Recommendations 41, namely to conduct a Review of WIPO technical assistance in the area of cooperation for development.

The terms of reference for the Review can be found on WIPO’s website at: www.wipo.int/edocs/mdocs/mdocs/en/cdip_4/cdip_4_8_rev_tor.pdf. [2]

In October 2010, WIPO hired two consultants to make an independent External Review of WIPO´s Technical Assistance in the Area of Cooperation for Development (Dr. Carolyn Deere Birkbeck, University of Oxford and Dr. Santiago Roca, Universidad ESAN, Peru).

In addition to this public consultation, other aspects of the Review include a desk review of WIPO documents and reports, a survey of WIPO’s developing country members, interviews with WIPO staff in Geneva, and a sample of six country studies (involving field visits to national intellectual property offices and other relevant national government and non-government stakeholders).

According to the Terms of Reference, the Review should cover WIPO Technical Assistance activities extended over the three year period from 2008 to 2010 (the country studies will cover a period of five years). The report of the Review will be available to all WIPO members and to the public.

Public Consultation Process

Those interested in submitting comments are invited to complete the following short questionnaire electronically and submit it via email to carolyn.deere@politics.ox.ac.uk and sroca@esan.edu.pe.

The deadline for comments is February 28, 2011.

[1] CDIP/4/8 Rev.

[2] This External Review also seeks to contribute to the assessment, recommended by the third session of the PCT Working Group (see document PCT/WG/3/14 Rev., paragraph 211bis) as to how well the PCT system has been functioning in terms of realizing its aims of organizing technical assistance for developing countries in the area of patents.