SPLT may render national patent systems ineffective: Legal experts Apprehensions are mounting in the developing economies over the Substantive Patent Law Treaty (SPLT), especially at a point when the WIPO Standing Committee on the Law of Patents is expected to sit across the table in a month's time and discuss it in the WIPO General Assembly. Experts point out that while SPLT and patent harmonisation by WIPO has a few positive aspects, the major concern is that national patent laws will become ineffective and this could affect public health objectives of nations. As Carlos M Correa of the University of Buenos Aires and Sisule F Musungu, South Centre Consultant, point out in their report on 'Multilateral agreements and a TRIPs - plus world: The World Intellectual Property Organisation,' ''The WIPO Patent Agenda has been conceived and executed without a serious analysis of its impact on development and that further harmonisation of patent law at the highest level does not seem to be in the interest of developing countries.'' Developing countries will have to pay greater attention to the Patent Agenda process and seek to influence it on the understanding that no effort will be spared to steer the process to suit the economic interests of the US, Japan and the EC and international businesses, says Drahos in his study for IPRs Commission. B K Keayla of the Peoples Commission on Patents says that SPLT will dilute the sovereign rights of national governments on the scope of patentability. According to a top government official, ''Rich countries increasingly regard the patent system as their primary tool of global economic control, and India should take a stand that it will be premature to accede SPLT negotiations at this stage when our own Indian Patent Office has not stood well on their own feet.'' International patent statistics shows that Indian patents constitute of only 0.6 per cent of the global patents and in this scenario SPLT does not look a beneficiary system for the country, said patent experts. India is not ready for a system like SPLT, they added. However, Delhi-based patent attorney Ravi Bhola of K&S Partners pointed out that the SPLT is not likely to come into force in the near future. ''People in the patent practice have been hearing about it for the last 25 years and it is claimed that it might take 15-20 years for it to come into picture.'' On the flip side, the National Patent System will become ineffective when the SPLT is implemented, Ravi said. He thinks that it would be most appropriate to restrict the SPLT to an extent, wherein it does not affect the rights of the countries in terms of meeting the requirements of national security and emergencies. WIPO would strategise to first make procedural laws acceptable to the international community and subsequently, would try to introduce more and more substantial law. ''Since SPLT would remove most of the remaining flexibility in patent system and pave the way for the future world patent granted directly by WIPO, which is an appealing proposal for multinational corporations and larger economic powers like EU and US, it would be prudent that India plays safe in the negotiations,'' said Dr K K Tripathi, Advisor, Department of Biotechnology. Sunita Sridharan, a Delhi-based patent attorney with Anand & Anand, said that SPLT itself is in the process of evolution through negotiations at the WIPO Meeting of the Standing Committee on the Law of Patents. ''Of the 16 articles, there have been a rare consensus on very few and some of the articles are yet to be debated upon. At this point, it would be premature to talk on the impact fo SPLT on Indian patent system,'' says Sunita. On the contrary, Ravi finds the proposed Patent Amendment Bill not addressing SPLT issues at this stage and the Bill is aiming at fulfilling only the obligation under WTO TRIPs. The Patent Agenda and other processes at WIPO, especially the SPLT negotiations, raise a recurring question about the extent to which developing countries can decisively influence the outcomes of international intellectual property standard setting processes, writes Drahos in his study. He concludes that due to the continued use of webs of coercion by the USA and the EC, developing countries still have comparatively little influence in international intellectual property standard setting. In fact, throughout most of their history, developing countries have never meaningfully exercised sovereignty over the setting of intellectual property standards because of their colonial heritage. The ongoing negotiations are aimed at creating uniform substantive patent law standards relating to issues of prior art, novelty, utility and inventiveness, requirements relating to sufficient disclosure, drafting and interpretation of claims, grounds of refusal for an application, and for revocation and invalidation of a patent. The major issues mentioned in the forthcoming agenda include, drafting model provisions for disclosure of origin of genetic resources under the CBD which would be discussed in COP-7 in Kuala Lumpur, SPLT provisions for the SCP which had its meeting in May 2004 (the SPLT has been impressed upon by the trilateral offices of USPTO, EPO and JPO) and the proposed treaty on broadcasters' rights. After this first phase of work, further harmonisation is envisaged, in areas where the main players, the US and Europe Union do not agree so far, such as the first to file versus first to invent principles and post grant opposition proceedings. Sunita Sridharan feels that harmonisation of patent law, theoretically, is an excellent idea. According to Ravi, harmonisation sorts out issues such as repetition, troublesome procedures and expenses involved in filing for patents separately in different countries. The proposition of meeting the procedural requirement at one forum appears to be favourable to inventors/applicants, he added. Ravi pointed out that a large number of patents, which are granted in India, without any novelty and inventiveness searches, would get filtered, thus paving way for upping the quality of patents. However, the situation that if a patent protection is granted in the US, the applicant will get protection on the same lines in other countries as well, could affect national interests/priorities. As Drahos puts it, ''The reality of standard setting for developing countries is that they operate with an intellectual property paradigm dominated by the US and the EC and international business interests TRIPs sets minimum standards. Bilaterally the bar on IP standards continues to be raised. When developing countries turn to WIPO for legislative assistance that steers them down the TRIPs plus path. They are not in a position to mobilise webs of coercion and have to rely on webs of dialogue.''