This report identifies options that negotiators and policy-makers could pursue in order to reach a permanent solution at the World Trade Organization (WTO) to the problems some developing countries say they face when buying food at government-set (or government-administered) prices under their public stockholding programs for food security purposes. The …
INFORMATION FEUDALISM . Peter Drahos with John Braithwaite . Earthscan Publications Limited . London . 2002 . Rs 920 In the last two decades, the intellectual property standards have changed drastically. Today, these rules are set by the global strategies of a small number of companies and business organisations. The …
Hunger and poverty are essentially a human-made problem and can, hence, be overcome by human beings. The apologists of status quo would have us believe that being poor is
Statistics are easy to window-dress: showing everything but concealing vital facts. It is true in case of the small-scale industries (SSIs) also. For an average Indian, SSIs are more than 3.4 million registered small-scale units (and an equal number in the unorganised sector); 100 per cent of sports goods exports …
FOR many years now, small-scale industries have been making ugly rounds of courts. From Delhi to Kolkata, Agra to Vellore, the story repeats itself. Rather with more ferocity. Acting on public interest litigations and frustrated at the government"s lackadaisical attitude, the courts are cracking the whip on the industries. So …
Interestingly, this unregulated and technically incompetent industry sector has been exclusively entrusted to manufacture items, which pollute the most in processes like the garments, leather tanning, dyeing and electroplating. "The economic logic behind this kind of reservation is a fraud," says Shreekant Gupta, reader, Delhi School of Economics, University of …
It is clear that small-scale industries (SSIs) can no longer afford to remain dirty and defiant. The same is true for the government. Not only is it a question of the livelihood of 20 million people but also about cleaning up India's environment, which again affects people. What is required …
proponents of the global intellectual property rights (ipr) system have long claimed that patents and copyrights are essential for promoting innovation. Pharmaceutical companies, for instance, will think twice about investing millions in research for new drugs if they are not assured of making economic gains from a monopoly on the …
The uk has finally stood up to the arm-twisting it has been subjected to at the hands of us biotechnology corporations. Top government functionaries of the country publicly voiced their resentment at being coerced into carrying out trials of genetically modified (gm) crops. The outburst came hard on the heels …
The Greater Access to Affordable Pharmaceuticals (gaap) Act may be a bitter pill to swallow for patent holders in the pharmaceutical industry. But it is definitely a shot in the arm for the generic drug segment. The legislation
the African continent, rich in its biodiversity, incurs losses worth billions of dollars every year due to ineffective legislations against biopiracy. At the Second South-South Bio-piracy Summit at the World Summit on Sustainable Development (wssd) in Johannesburg recently, it was observed that biopiracy
INDIAN AGRICULTURE UNDER SCAN This site scores quite a few firsts. The obvious one - it discusses Indian agriculture, or to be precise the politics and economics of Indian agriculture. Then, it is run by a group of left-oriented Indian economists and some other like-minded experts. To top all this, …
Emil Salim, chair of the global preparatory committee for the World Summit on Sustainable Development (wssd) and former Indonesian environment minister has urged India's Prime Minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, to lead the delegation of the developing world in Johannesburg. He has, meanwhile, exhorted countries not to bow to the internal …
In a strange twist to the raging lumber dispute between the us and Canada, both nations have interpreted a recent World Trade Organisation (wto) ruling on the issue as a vindication of their respective stands. While the us contends that it has scored a "technical point', Canada says the body …
In a major blow to the us biotech industry, the European parliament recently approved one of the world’s most stringent regulations on labelling of genetically modified organisms (gmo). The parliament has also decided to retain the ongoing moratorium on the import of numerous gm products till the regulation comes into …
the term patent is not usually well received in India. It immediately brings to mind images of biopiracy, of large transnational entities making profits out of knowledge and natural resources protected and conserved by the poor. Communities have nurtured knowledge and health systems over millennia, a prime example being ayurveda. …
the bitter spat that ensued over poor maintenance of animals in research laboratories saw two heads roll in the Union cabinet. The two ministers had been taking potshots at each other ever since the Pune-based National Institute of Virology (niv) was raided by the Committee for the Purpose of Control …
The fear of an epidemic is sweeping Israel with the first case of mad cow disease having been reported in the country. The disease was found in a cow in a farming settlement in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. However, to allay apprehensions, officials contended that no infected meat had reached …
