Final Report of Uganda Intellectual Property ... - IPRsonline.org

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Mart Leesti and Tom Pengelly ― Technical and Financial Co-operation Needs for
Implementation of the WTO TRIPS Agreement in Uganda
• Harmonized, predictable and transparent arrangements for programme funding, management and
co-ordination by development partners, with emphasis on upgrading and utilizing the Government’s
own public financial and procurement systems as far as possible.
• Mechanisms for regular multi-partner joint reporting, review and evaluation of a common set of
expected results, impacts and outcomes, as opposed to multiple discrete systems which place a
heavy and unnecessary burden on the lead government agencies.
The detailed design development of such programmes in Sierra Leone and Uganda would require
technical assistance and thorough consultations between Government, national stakeholders and the
countries’ development partners. This would probably take at least 6-12 months to complete.
For both countries, the starting point for programme development could be based on the Outline
Programme Planning Matrix of strategic objectives, needs identified, main activities proposed to
address these needs, lead agencies involved, provisional timings, and possible development partners,
provided at Annex A of both of reports of the national needs assessment diagnostic studies.
However, we note that the final decisions on when and how best to follow-up the reports of their needs
assessment diagnostic studies, of course, rests with Sierra Leone and Uganda.
A specific issue which each country will need to consider relates to their membership of the ARIPO
system for patents, trademarks, industrial designs and copyright, and in particular both countries’
present dependence upon ARIPO for most of their substantive patent examination functions. This
therefore raises the question as to whether it would make sense for Sierra Leone and Uganda, as well
as other ARIPO members, if an assessment of ARIPO’s needs for technical assistance and financial cooperation
should be undertaken and implemented in parallel with their own national programmes.