Learn about

World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO)

and Cannabis.

The Cannabis Embassy’s Permanent Mission in Geneva, Paris, Rome, and Montreal (part of the Ministry of External Affairs) has published 7 articles about Cannabis & World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO).

Legatio Cannabis
大麻大使馆
سفارة القنب

Flag of the Cannabis Embassy

The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) is the specialised United Nations agency responsible for the global governance of intellectual property. It develops international legal frameworks affecting how States regulate and protect knowledge, innovations, and cultural expressions. WIPO also manages international registries for trademarks, patents, appellations of origins, etc, and is funded in part through fees collected.

The Cannabis Embassy monitors and contributes to several aspects of WIPO which affect Cannabis:

WIPO’s IGC (Intergovernmental Committee on Intellectual Property and Genetic Resources, Traditional Knowledge and Folklore) is the principal forum addressing biopiracy, the misuse of Traditional Knowledge (TK), and Intellectual Property (IP) issues related to Genetic Resources (GRs, i.e. Cannabis seeds), including fair access and benefit-sharing (ABS/FABS). The IGC was the forum that negotiated the 2024 GRATK Treaty, and is working on a future Treaty against the misuse of TK and traditional cultural expressions (TCE).

WIPO also manages the Lisbon System for the protection of Appellations of Origin (AO) and Geographical Indications (GI), and the Madrid System allowing frameworks like collective and certification marks (AO equivalent in common law countries). WIPO also administers the global patents system, relevant to Cannabis-related innovation, but also to the protection against misappropriation & the fair access and benefit-sharing for Indigenous Peoples and local Cannabis communities. The Cannabis Embassy also participates on the WIPO Committee on Development & Intellectual Property (CDIP).

Although not a UN agency, the UPOV (International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants from French “Union pour la Protection des Obtentions Végétales”) is integrated within WIPO. We monitor UPOV as its quasi-patent system of “breeders’ rights” impact small farmers’ rights, especially concerning “landraces” (traditional Cannabis cultivars and Indigenous seed systems).

The work at WIPO and at UPOV in particular interacts and happens within a broader international landscape that includes other treaties like the CBD and its Nagoya Protocol, the Plant Treaty, or the  WTO TRIPS Agreement, as well as other UN bodies such as the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues or the UNESCO.

Regional Groups & the Indigenous Caucus

Differently from most UN fora which are organised with the usual “regional groups” (AG, APG, EEG, GRULAC, WEOG), the WIPO and particularly the IGC are organised with different, sometimes overlapping regional or topical groups:

🌍 African Group (AG)
🌏 Asia-Pacific Group (APG)
🌍 Central European and Baltic States (CEBS)
🌎 Group of Latin American and Caribbean Countries (GRULAC)
🌎 Group B (roughly equivalent to WEOG, i.e. the richest and most “industrialised countries”)
🌎 Group of Central Asian, Caucasus and Eastern European States (“CACEES”)
🌎 People’s Republic of China, acts as its own regional group

🌐 Group of Like-Minded Countries (“LMC”)
🌐 European Union and its Member States

🌐 Indigenous Caucus, representatuves of Indigenous Peoples, First Nations, Aboriginal Peoples, and other colonised non- or semi-sovereign Nations. The Indigenous Caucus has been acting at a regional group level at the IGC in partiicular.

This topic is handled by the Permanent Mission to Geneva (and Paris, Rome, Montreal) under the Cannabis Embassy’s Ministry of External Affairs

The Cannabis Embassy’s Permanent Mission in Geneva (PM Geneva) is the Cannabis Embassy Government‘s body (under the Ministry of External Affairs) mandated to interact with international organisations headquartered in Geneva as well as Paris, Rome, and Montréal.

Currently, the PM Geneva is engaged with:

  • CBD. Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity (Montreal).
  • FAO. Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (Rome).
  • ILO. International Labour Organisation.
  • OHCHR. Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.
  • Human Rights Treaty Bodies.
  • UNCTAD. United Nations Conference on Trade and Development.
  • UNESCO. United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organisation (Paris).
  • UPOV. International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants.
  • South Centre.
  • WHO. World Health Organisation
  • WIPO. World Intellectual Property Organisation.

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