The European Union (EU) is reported to be funding the drafting of Uganda's controversial Counterfeit Goods Bill, a proposed law that has caused an outcry as it threatens access to life-saving generic medicines in this low income East African country. According to the article, about 90% of medicines used in Uganda's health-care system are imported, of which about 93% are generics. According to this article, part of the five million euros that Uganda's ministry on tourism, trade and industry received from the EU in a financing agreement signed in July 2009 was to finance the drafting of this contentious bill that has consistently been criticised as a threat to treatment. The financing agreement is aimed at supporting Uganda's implementation of the economic partnership agreement (EPA) between the EU and East African countries. Health activists have criticised the draft law for defining counterfeiting so broadly as to criminalise the production and importation of generic medicines, including those for HIV and AIDS and malaria. They note that the draft law does not take advantage of the flexibility that Uganda, as a least developed country, has until 2016 before it is obliged to provide patent protection for pharmaceutical products as per the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) regime of the World Trade Organisation.
Health equity in economic and trade policies
The head of the European Union (EU) delegation to Tanzania, Ambassador Timothy Clark, says a realistic timetable for signing the East African Community’s (EAC) interim economic partnership agreements (EPAs) must be established. Clark said: 'The situation, as it stands now, is untenable. EAC countries, despite not signing the EPA, have been enjoying free access to EU markets in the same way with other African, Carribean and Pacific (ACP) countries that took legally binding commitments by signing EPAs. This is inconsistent and contrary to both EU law and World Trade Organization rules.' However, Tanzanian Trade Minister, Mary Nagu, said the EAC wanted firm commitments from the EU on development assistance before it would sign a full agreement, including assistance for infrastructure, such as properly working railways and ports to enable Tanzania to trade. She called for a level playing field for Tanzanian trade, with Tanzania enjoying an equal footing with the EU. She did not see aid as a long-term solution to the country's financial woes. Despite the current situation, withdrawing trade preferences provided to the EAC under the EU’s EPA market access regulation is reported to require a unanimous vote by EU Member States, which may prove politically difficult at present.
Following a meeting with trade ministers from the African, Caribbean and Pacific countries with the European Union (EU) in Brussels Wednesday, the European Commission said existing modalities supporting trade preferences would no longer be in force from January 1, 2008.
Economic partnership agreements were one of the topics discussed at the 6th African, Caribbean and Pacific Summit of Heads of State and Government held in Accra, Ghana from 30 September to 3 October. African, Caribbean and Pacific countries decided whether to sign agreements that they have initialled, re-negotiate them or expand interim goods agreements further. Among the conclusions of the analysis of this topic are that the provisions on movement of capital and entry of EU providers of financial services may magnify the problem of instability that new financial services generate, and that the developing countries would have to undertake obligations in market access and rules in new areas (investment, government procurement, competition policy) that had been rejected as negotiating topics in the WTO. For example the right to regulate services has been narrowed further than GATS, universal service provision will be more limited.
India and the European Union (EU) have signed an agreement that puts more stringent conditions on EU customs authorities that consider stopping shipments of generic pharmaceuticals passing through Europe. The EU has committed to change the regulation that led to seizures in 2008 of legitimate generics from India passing through the Netherlands and other European countries on their way to South America and Africa. The seizures had been initiated by European patent holders even though the shipments were in transit and not destined for European markets. A key element of the agreement is the core principle that ‘the mere fact that medicines are in transit through EU territory, and that there is a patent title applicable to such medicines in EU territory, does not in itself constitute enough grounds for customs authorities in any Member State to suspect that the medicines at stake infringe patent rights’. Only if there is adequate evidence of a likely diversion of medicines into the EU market, then can EU authorities have grounds for suspicion of infringement of intellectual property rights.
The European Union (EU) has committed to concluding a new free trade agreement (FTA) with India, known formally as the Bilateral Trade and Investment Agreement (BITA), by the end of 2012, but the BITA may have significant adverse implications for India’s generic pharmaceutical industry that supplies much of the developing world’s antiretroviral (ARV) medications and other drugs. Critics argue that free trade agreements that may create new intellectual property obligations for India can increase ARV prices, impede the development of acceptable dosage forms, and delay access to new and better ARVs. They also state that by pressuring India and other developing countries to accept new intellectual property rules for pharmaceuticals, the EU threatens to undermine the Doha Declaration, a TRIPS-related agreement that is intended to ensure that low- and middle-income countries gain access to affordable medicines. The schedule for the next round of BITA negotiations in September 2012 has yet to be released and preparations are shrouded in secrecy. Neither party has sufficiently acknowledged the impact the FTA may have on millions of the world’s poorest people, who rely on India’s generic pharmaceutical industry to provide them with access to life-saving treatments.
European governments have promised to fix laws that caused generic medicine seizures in the Netherlands, the Indian Minister of Commerce and Industry announced. He added that seizures were illegal under the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights agreement. Minister Anand Sharma pointed to significant savings in buying Indian-made generics for developing countries, for example by reducing the price of treatment for one patient for one year of antiretroviral medicines from US$12,000 to $400. He cautioned against confusing generic medicines with counterfeits, arguing that India was fully TRIPS compliant. India has had meetings with the Directorate-General for Trade at the European Commission, and European Union (EU) Trade Commissioner Karel De Gucht and his predecessor Catherine Ashton in this regard. Some were expecting India to call for formation of a panel in the dispute case after several months of consultations, but the Minister said that he has received ‘clear assurance [from] the EU trade commissioner that the notification under which actions were taken was misinterpreted and will be amended to plug all loopholes’.
The health sector is to be excluded from draft European legislation designed to open up the market for services throughout the European Union’s 25 member states. The European Commission in Brussels has decided to radically overhaul its original proposal because of wide ranging opposition to the plans it tabled last year to abolish national restrictions on service providers.
Africa’s share of world trade declined from 5.5% in 1980 to 2% in 2003, with an overwhelming dependency on trade with the EU (European Union). Trade policies have a critical role to play in supporting economic development across Africa. These policies are increasingly set through agreements in international arenas. Whilst the World Trade Organisation has set trade rules that have implications for African countries, it is a new generation of bilateral/regional trade and investment agreements that will critically determine the types of trade and wider economic policies that governments can use to support development. There are widespread and justified fears that the configuration of the EPA negotiating blocs will undermine rather than promote aid effectiveness.
Policymakers from the EU and developing countries, together with non governmental organisations and academics, met from 21-24 January at Wilton Park for a strategic and creative dialogue on the effectiveness of European development policy. With input from the Department for International Development and the European Centre for Development Policy Management, the group discussed Europe's development agenda and potential reforms. The group considered ways to improve aid effectiveness in preparation for the Paris commitment review meeting in Accra in September: the closing session was led by the Ghanaian Finance Minister.