 The 12th Ministerial Conference of the World Trade Organization is set to take place in Geneva and Switzerland from June 12th to 15th. There are a number of issues on the agenda, but the one which has received the most attention is the question of the trade-related intellectual property rights waiver or the trips waiver on COVID-19 related products. The proposal was first introduced by India and South Africa in 2020. It seeks to waive certain intellectual property rights on vaccines, tests and medicines. However, ever since the proposal came up, there has been stiff resistance from rich countries who are unhappy at the commercial implications. This is even as only 13% of the population in low-income countries has been vaccinated. What is the history of this proposal and what have been the negotiations so far? Anna Rajar of the People's Health Dispatch explains. TRIPS waiver proposal was first tabled in October 2020 by India and South Africa at the World Trade Organization. What India and South Africa sought to do at the time was lifting intellectual property prerogatives on COVID-19 products. So it included vaccines, it included testing, it included the medication that would be used in the fight against COVID-19. So this has dragged on for quite a bit of time and essentially it was down to opposition by rich countries and the rich countries are opposing the trips waiver largely because of pressure by the pharmaceutical companies by Big Pharma, which is stationed in the global north and which is basically increasing its influence and exerting its influence over the governments and the delegations that are attending the WTO negotiations. So because of this, what we have seen over the past 18 months or a bit more is that the original waiver, it's being sidelined and instead of the original, we are seeing alternative versions, what are called compromise versions or statements coming from the global north, essentially from the European Union and these versions are much more restrictive and much more limited in what they're aiming to do or what they're saying that they're aiming to do. And of course, one of the most recent examples of such an alternative version coming up was just a couple of months ago when a text was leaked by the European Union, which was presented as the outcome of negotiations from a small group of countries, which included the US, India and South Africa and it was presented as an alternative text on which the group had agreed and wanted to table at the WTO. What's interesting is that it turned out that this version did not enjoy the support of even those members who took part in the negotiations. So up to this day, only the EU has essentially and explicitly said it supported such a text. But on the other hand, this text seems to have hit a note with the WTO leadership and so this limited and quite limiting text is what we're seeing being discussed at the moment by the delegation as they approach the 12th ministerial conference, which is set to start on the 12th of June. The trips waiver is no mere policy prescription or legal clause. It has concrete effects for millions of people across the world. What are the ways in which the trips waiver could benefit people? What kind of positions have countries in the global South taken against the aggressive lobbying by the rich countries? In the case of this new alternative version, what's being discussed is basically what already exists and what is already covered under trips flexibilities. So that's one of the biggest problems that has been underlined by global South delegations and basically by civil society because they are saying that what the global North is pushing for will not make it easier for them to actually use the flexibilities and increase access to vaccines. So for example, we have seen that the UK and Switzerland in particular are trying to put pressure on. So when we talk about lifting patents under such a decision or the waiver, they wanted to apply for a waiver. A producer should list all the patents that are included in the final product in the vaccine. So this is not such a simple thing. It's actually a very complicated thing because vaccines and other products, they're impacted and they're shaped under the influence of many patents. So for someone to be able to list them all, they should put in quite a bit of effort. And this would discourage the producers to actually try and implement such a measure. On the other hand, we're also seeing that the global North delegations are pushing. They're actually advocating for compulsory licensing, which already exists, as I've said, under the trips flexibilities. But they're very rarely used because it's a long process to apply for them. And also because especially in the global South, the governments are put under pressure by the rich countries and by the pharma industry to actually give up and not go down this road. And so what we're seeing is that the rich countries are saying these things that we have, essentially compulsory licensing should be enough to increase access to COVID-19 vaccines. And we really shouldn't look at anything else. There are a couple of more things which the current alternative decision seems to incorporate. And that's a time limit. So it wouldn't be a general waiver, but it would have a time frame in which it can be applied. It's a bit unclear what happens after this time it's up. So how do we approach that? And an additional and final one of the additional problems is that the rich countries, the global North, would like the waiver to be applied only for certain selected countries. And in a way that would exclude those countries which have produced, that have insured 10% or more of global supply in 2021. And so essentially this would mean that China is out of the game. And this has been an issue, a problem which has been raised over and over again during the negotiations process. Of course, the process has been very dragged on. So it's with the ministerial being so close and with the negotiations still ongoing and with the information coming from the WTO that the global south is being increasingly excluded from the negotiations, from the discussions that global North delegations are threatening to actually walk out if the global south doesn't total line. They have, these information have caused like a round of very intense reaction in civil society. So ever since the compromise decision was leaked by the European Union, we have seen civil society and particularly trade justice and hell justice activists raising their voice against this compromise and pointing out that actually if we have to, if we're looking at this kind of so-called waiver, then it's better not to have a waiver at all because essentially it's even more limiting that what we're asked to rely on now. So there has been a round of protests announced by civil society during the ministerial, which will be starting around Sunday. And in addition to that, of course, coalition remains for the global south to actually buy some to walk out from such a negotiation and stand up to what the global North is pushing for.