This paper seeks to raise awareness about the importance of managing IP to facilitate humanitarian use and applications. Our goal is to identify intellectual property approaches that can promote access to and use of health and agricultural product innovations by poor and disadvantaged groups, particularly in low?-income countries. The paper encourages more public-sector IP managers to understand and employ strategies that will accomplish these goals. Humanitarian use approaches should become the norm, and we seek to help private?]sector licensees understand the rationale and potential benefits behind such strategies. This paper focuses on the pharmaceutical and agricultural sectors, but the principles noted could potentially be applied to other areas as well. There are key moments when technology managers can improve the likelihood that their IP will benefit people in need: when they decide 1) who will receive a license, 2) whether the license will be exclusive, 3) what types of applications will be covered, and 4) how long the duration of the license will be....The license agreement can further increase access through specific terms that govern the use of the technology for research, the licensee’s freedom to grant sublicenses, and the treatment of follow-on innovations developed by the licensee. We acknowledge that improved IP management cannot by itself solve the access crisis....This paper deals with voluntary strategies, but this is not meant to exclude other approaches, such as incorporating some of the suggested changes in IP management into public policies, laws, or treaty reform. The advantage of voluntary strategies is that they can be implemented immediately, without the complexities involved in changing regulations and legal requirements.
Posted by
Peter Suber at 11/12/2005 08:10:00 AM.
The open access movement:
Putting peer-reviewed scientific and scholarly literature
on the internet. Making it available free of charge and
free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.
Removing the barriers to serious research.
