Support the Development of Vibrant Innovation Ecosystems in Developing Countries

November 10, 2021

The Sub-forum on Intellectual Property Protection and Business Environment Optimization under the 4th Hongqiao International Economic Forum co-hosted by the China Council for the Promotion of International Trade (CCIPT), China National Intellectual Property Administration (CNIPA) and National Copyright Administration of China (NCAC) was held in Shanghai on November 5, 2021. Mr. Carsten Fink, Chief Economist of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), was invited to participate in the Panel Discussion of the Sub-forum.

Mr. Carsten Fink first expressed his warm congratulations on China's strong performance in the Global Innovation Index not only this year where China moved to 12th position but really for China’s continuous rise in the ranking over the past decade. He was confident that China’s rise in the rankings was meaningful. He contended that the rise of China’s innovation economy was not just an artifact of one or two indicators, but something that we were seeing in all pillars of the innovation ecosystem. In many ways, China has leap forward the historical path towards its establishing an innovation-focused economy.

Carsten Fink pointed to three areas where the world is changing and highlighted the implications for multilateral governance in relation to intellectual property. The first area is the globalization of economic activity. During the period of hyper globalization, intellectual property holders have increasingly thought to protect their intellectual property abroad. This had brought a dual implication on multilateral intellectual property governance. The first thing is that the principle of non-discrimination, the principle of national treatment, the principle of most favored nation treatment that were established in WIPO treaties more than a hundred years ago are still crucial cornerstones of the international system today even if the world has much changed. Secondly, it has become imperative to make the process of acquiring IP rights by countries around the world as efficiently as possible while respecting that different countries sometimes have different rules and approaches to intellectual property protection.

The second area is technological change. The information technology revolution that started several decades ago has evolved into the fourth industrial revolution with wide-spread digitalization of all kinds of aspects of economic and societal life—big data analysis and artificial intelligence at the center of the revolution. Mr. Carsten Fink contended that these technologies would force every country to re-evaluate the question whether it needs to adapt intellectual property norms to new technologies on the one hand, and are changing the way intellectual property offices around the world and WIPO itself operate on the other hand.

Finally, in discussing the third area, Carsten Fink pointed out that there is still substantial innovation and intellectual property divide in the world. Take the PCT system as an example, just six countries, China, Germany, Japan, the Republic of Korea, the United Kingdom and the United States account for more than 80% of international patent filings. That makes a strong case to support the development of vibrant innovation ecosystem in developing countries which of course is a challenge. Intellectual property is only one component of the successful innovation ecosystems and investments in innovation take resources that in many developing countries are scarce. The certain scope is to share expertise and invest the building of IP institutions that will have long-term benefits.

Carsten Fink noted that the story of China is certainly won that goals to show that a long-term commitment to building up a science, technology and innovation system can make a big difference and it would be great to see additional countries following China's example.