Within the next 12 months there are intellectual property deadlines looming for developing countries that could have a significant impact on their future access to medicines. These relate to the World Trade Organisation’s (WTO) Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) Agreement. This Agreement outlines the intellectual property obligations for all 144 WTO members, including...

BACKGROUND In order to ensure their population's regular access to essential medicines, many least developed countries and developing countries are faced with the policy question of whether to import or manufacture drugs locally, in particular for life-saving antiretroviral medicines for HIV/AIDS patients. In order for domestic manufacturing to be viable and cost-effective, the local industry m...

The success of global climate policies over the coming decades depends on the diffusion of ’green’ technologies. This requires that international environmental agreements (IEAs) and trade-related intellectual property rights (TRIPs) interact productively. Using a simple and tractable model, we highlight the strategic reduction in abatement commitments on account of a hold-up effect. In anticipa...

How to structure IP laws in order to maximize social welfare by striking the right balance between incentives to innovate and access to innovation is an empirical question. It is a challenging one to answer, both because innovation is difficult to value and because changes in IP protection are rare. The 1995 TRIPS agreement provides a unique opportunity to explore this question for two reasons....

We develop a new theoretical political economy framework called ‘parallel contest’ that emphasizes the fight over trade agreement (TA) ratification within countries. TA is inherently uncertain in each country because anti- and pro-trade interests contest other to influence their own government's decision. As terms-of-trade theory of TAs, removes externalities created by unilateral tariffs. But,...

The article deals with the relationship between United States and Mexico from perspective of US national security. key areas strategic interest in on part include: limiting illegal immigration, fighting drug-related crime, economic cooperation, both bilateral wider international dimension, for example North American Free Trade Agreement. According to States, all three factors their successful i...