The Chair, His Excellency Ambassador Philip Richard Owade, opened the session and invited the Director General of WIPO, Mr. Francis Gurry, to take the floor.
The Director General welcomed the participants to the session, noting that it had been 10 years since the establishment of the IGC. He recalled that the 2009 WIPO General Assembly had given the IGC its strongest mandate yet. The mandate foresaw text based negotiations and an intense work program including Intersessional Working Groups (IWGs). Unprecedented progress had been made under that mandate since September 2009, especially within the last 18 months. There were now single negotiating texts for each of the three main topics. He said that it had been an extremely intense schedule and extended his thanks to all delegations for their very active and energetic involvement. This had taken place in an excellent and constructive atmosphere which had helped achieve results. He also acknowledged the effective contribution of indigenous experts who had participated in the process and, renewed the appeal for further funding for the WIPO Voluntary Fund for Accredited and Indigenous Communities (the Voluntary Fund) to enable the participation of indigenous experts in future meetings. The mandate of 2009 foresaw that the IGC would submit a text(s) of an international legal instrument(s) which would ensure the effective protection of genetic resources (GRs), traditional knowledge (TK) and traditional cultural expressions (TCEs), and also that the WIPO General Assembly would decide on convening a Diplomatic Conference. Being the last session of the IGC before the General Assembly, the delivery of the biennium’s work to the General Assembly with a view to future work was certainly an extremely important item that the IGC would be considering. Mr. Gurry lastly extended his gratitude to Ambassador Owade for ably chairing the IGC during the last meetings, noting that he had presided over the most productive years of the IGC, the ones that had taken the IGC the furthest distance. He had done so with extraordinary energy and commitment. In addition, the Chair had consulted many of the participants, in particular in the course of the last week. He wished the participants a very constructive and productive session.
The Chair, in his opening remarks, noted that delegations had shown tremendous commitment, resourcefulness and resolve to make progress. However, the work and progress made so far had to be sustained. At this final stage, the IGC had two challenges to overcome - the IGC had to make progress on substance by taking forward to the WIPO General Assembly a cleaner, neater and elegant text that should reflect an outcome the IGC would be proud of. At the same time, a decision had to be taken for the General Assembly on future work that would preserve the integrity and continuity of the work of the IGC. He was confident that he could count on the individual and collective effort of the IGC. The IGC owed it to future generations and to humanity to succeed and failure was not an option. He recalled that, at the last session of the IGC in May 2011, he had been asked to discuss with delegations the work program, expected objectives and working methodology for the present session. Accordingly, he had consulted with Geneva based delegations on two occasions, on June 24, 2011 and on July 15, 2011. In addition, since the last meeting, Member States had organized two important opportunities for consultation and discussion of technical and procedural issues: first, Oman had organized a Symposium on databases and documentation, a report of which was made available to the present session of the IGC as document WIPO/GRTKF/IC/19/INF/10. Second, Indonesia had hosted a meeting in Bali, Indonesia of Like-minded Countries (LMCs), which had resulted in the Bali Recommendation, made available as document WIPO/GRTKF/IC/19/8. The respective Member States were thanked for having organized these meetings as they were all helpful in advancing the work of the IGC. In his capacity as IGC Chair, he had been invited to both meetings, but because they occurred on almost the same dates, he regrettably had only been able to attend the meeting in Bali. He was impressed by the outcome of that meeting in terms of substance and process. These consultations, both in Geneva and elsewhere, had proved invaluable to him in the preparation for the present session. He had taken note of the various comments and suggestions, and would later make proposals on the program for the week and the working methodology. He recalled that under the IGC’s current mandate, the IGC was required to report to the General Assembly taking place in September 2011, which was expected to take important decisions on the future of the IGC’s work. IGC 19 was expected, therefore, to discuss and reach agreement, under the Future Work agenda item, on the decision to transmit to the Assembly. At the present session, the IGC also had to make real progress in its “text-based negotiations” on TK, TCEs and GRs. The challenge at hand was, therefore to devise a work program and a working methodology that were transparent, credible, inclusive and efficient in order to make good use of the time available. He stressed that the present session was a working, negotiating session and he hoped for a constructive working atmosphere. To this end, no opening statements were provided for in the draft Agenda. Member States wishing to make opening statements were advised to hand them in to the Secretariat and they would be reflected in the report, as had happened at IGC 18. In acknowledging the importance and value of the indigenous representatives present at the meeting, he recognized the concerns they had on the substance of the work, as well as on the procedure. He reiterated that, in so far as drafting proposals were concerned, observers’ proposals could remain in the text if supported by a Member State. On that understanding, he would continue to enable observers to make statements and proposals at all times, and ensure that they could do so interspersed with Member State proposals. He also strongly encouraged Member States and observers to interact with each other informally, as this increased the chances that Member States would be aware of, understood and perhaps supported observer proposals. Consultations were important to increase the chances that valuable statements by indigenous representatives were supported and included in the text(s). He also intended to meet with the indigenous representatives during the course of the week.
