| Description: |
The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) has been providing technical assistance to the government of Zimbabwe for the elaboration of a national intellectual property (IP) policy and strategy since 2012. Since then, progress has been made and in December 2014, a multi-stakeholders meeting which brought together over 40 participants from various ministries, Research and Development (R&D) institutions, as well as IP private practitioners and Patent agents was organized in Harare. The main objective was to validate the IP policy and strategy document. However the meeting did not achieve its objective because of lack inclusive representation as some key stakeholders were not represented. It was also noted that the document which was prepared following an IP audit in 2012, needed up-dating to reflect the prevailing IP situation in the country. It was there agreed that further work needed to be done before organizing an inclusive stakeholders workshop (with participants from outside the capital as well) thereby assuring ownership of the IP policy and strategy. See attached mission report.
In recent discussions and exchange of e-mails between officials of the Zimbabwe Intellectual Property Office (ZIPO), and the Regional Bureau for Africa, it was confirmed that the draft IP policy and implementation strategy had been circulated to the key stakeholders for their comments and input. Subsequently ZIPO requested WIPO’s assistance for the organization of the validation workshop in order to finalize the documents. In the spirit of inclusiveness of the stakeholders it is proposed, as requested by ZIPO, that WIPO facilities the participation of 5 local participants from the region. WIPO provided this facilitation in the meeting which took place December 2014.
It is now proposed to organize the validation workshop on September 10 and 11, 2015.
The following is submitted for your consideration and approval, please:
1. Title: Multi-Stakeholders Wo |