Between the 17Th and 25Th of July, the Twice-Yearly WIPO Copyright Negotiating Committee

Update from the WIPO copyright negotiations in Geneva

Between the 17th and 25th of July, the twice-yearly WIPO Copyright negotiating committee met in Geneva. WBU brought a team from all four corners of the globe.

The Bad News

1. We had expected the WIPO member states to finalise a workable treaty text. Instead the text has many square brackets still (areas where agreement has not yet been reached) despite many late night sessions and much hard work from the majority of WIPO member states

2. We had wanted the Committee to agree that there would be a diplomatic conference in 2013 to finish work on the treaty. In fact, it did not agree on the nature of the text, despite many delegations supporting a treaty, and they postponed a decision on whether to call a diplomatic conference until December 2012.

The Good News

For the first time, the Committee has set out a path towards the end of this long-running campaign.

Almost all WIPO member states back our treaty, and many stated this at the start of the meeting. It was particularly heartening to hear Australia and Singapore do so. Both of these countries had refrained from calling for a treaty until this meeting.

Many member states-Australia, Brazil, Ecuador, Egypt, India, Nigeria, Pakistan and the UK, to name just some of them- worked tirelessly in this meeting under the expert chairmanship of Zambian Ambassador Darlington Mwape to move the Committee towards agreeing our treaty.

The Committee agreed that end date COULD be 2013 IF the WIPO Member States decide to call a diplomatic conference for 2013 when they meet in an "extraordinary general assembly" scheduled for December 2012. (See the Committee's Conclusions attached for further details)

The text

Much of the discussion took place behind closed doors rather than in plenary session. WBU, as a non-governmental organisation, could not therefore witness the positions the various member states took. However, we will keep working to try to ensure that the text reflects our concerns and is workable so that we will be able to use the resulting law to provide accessible books for blind people.

Next steps

The European Union Commission still has to obtain a formal mandate from the European Council to come to WIPO and agree a treaty. It will ask for that mandate in September, and should receive it, if the EU Member States agree, in October 2012.

The US government is the other major player still yet to come off the fence and declare its support for a treaty.

WBU will keep working to try to achieve more active support from these parties, as well as towards a fully effective and clear treaty text.

The next formal SCCR meeting will take place between 19th and 25th November 2012.