For several years, research at the Max Planck Institute for Intellectual Property and Competition Law (MPI) - in collaboration with experts from all over the world - has examined the trend of bilateral and regional agreements that include provisions on the protection and enforcement of intellectual property (IP) rights. By building on this research, the following principles – express core concerns regarding the use of IP provisions as a bargaining chip in international trade negotiations, the increasing comprehensiveness of international IP rules and the lack of transparency and inclusiveness in the negotiating process; and – recommend international rules and procedures that can achieve a better, mutually advantageous and balanced regulation of international IP. These principles emanate from several consultations within the MPI and especially from a workshop that was held with external experts in October 2012 in Munich, Germany. They represent the views of those first signatories and are open to signature by scholars who share the objectives of the Principles

This article is about how geographical indications (GIs) cannot deliver the protection for traditional knowledge that indigenous peoples seek. There are three broad ways in which the protection of geographical indications appears to offer the possibility of providing legal mechanisms to protect traditional knowledge. These are the collective nature of the protection, the indefinite availability of the GI and the connection that GI owners perceive between their products and their land. Those seeking protection of traditional knowledge also seek a collective and an indefinite interest and frequently the relationship between their knowledge and the land is important for indigenous peoples. Yet, these similarities are superficial. GIs protect names and are used by Western farmers and sometimes rural communities to promote their products. This article concludes that GIs cannot deliver the protection that indigenous peoples seek in order to benefit from their traditional knowledge.

Biological invasions are a ubiquitous global concern. Invasive species are non-native species that arrive in a new area, establish and increase in density and distribution to the detriment of the recipient environment. Such species that become invasive are a major threat to biodiversity (Vitousek and D’Antonio, 1997). Unlike inanimate risks, living things establish, reproduce and often spread, leading to enormous environmental and economic effects (Vilà et al., 2010).

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What inventions are patentable is the core issue in patent law. Lord Cooke, when he was a Court of Appeal judge, ruled that the definition of invention, under the Patents Act 1953, included the part of the Statute of Monopolies of 1623 known as the proviso. Amongst other things the proviso excludes matters that raise prices of commodities at home or are generally inconvenient from being inventions for the purposes of the Act. Cooke J held that the presence of the proviso meant that when patents are applied for inventions that raise matters of economic concern the courts should resist breaking new ground and Parliament should deal with the matter. In reaching that interpretation of the definition of invention Cooke J said that because of the diversity of international views on the patentability of methods of medical treatment, the Court could not shut its eyes to the fact that the application before it might result in raising prices of commodities at home or be generally inconvenient. At the core of Cooke J's reasoning was the particular economic questions that arise for a country the size of New Zealand. This article discusses the treatment of Cooke J's approach in the courts and in the patent registration system. The article also discusses the role of public opinion concerning economic and social policy issues arising in the patent system. The article concludes that Cooke J's interpretation should continue to guide New Zealand's approach to what is an invention, and thus what is patentable subject matter.