On 15 November 2022, experts from Latin America (LA) and the European Union participated as speakers in a virtual workshop on plant varieties organised by IP Key LA.

The event addressed issues related to the Convention of the International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV). This convention is the basis on which the European Union’s member states rely to promote plant breeding through the granting of an intellectual property right: the plant breeder’s right.

This activity will support the identification of the measures and actions taken by authorities and operators in relation to marketplaces in Latin America included in the Watch List, by monitoring and reporting on any follow-up operations and developments on the issues described in the Watch List.

This activity seeks to support FTA implementations

At the beginning of December, the ‘Workshop for Latin American Customs Officials on the Enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights’ was held in an online and face-to-face format in Mexico and Panama. It was undertaken in collaboration with the National Customs Agency of Mexico and the National Customs Authority of Panama.

The main objective was to inform the region’s customs officials of best practices in the detection of IPR infringements at borders as well as through so-called small consignments.

With the main objective of presenting success stories and best practices, IP Key Latin America (LA) invited authorities and institutions from all Latin American countries to the forum ‘Enforcement of IP rights in the digital world’. This online event took place on 29 November and featured experts in IP rights.

This activity, comprising a feasibility study on the possible creation of a CAN trade mark registration system with the aim of evaluating the practicality of developing a CAN regional registration system for trade marks and its benefits for the Andean community, and for the companies operating in the region.

The purpose of this activity, building on the work accomplished under IP Key LA (creation of a compendium of decisions on designs in July 2021), is to compare, analyse and assess the practice regarding examination and registration, and the level of harmonisation among the four CAN IPOs. 

This workshop will be an opportunity to share experiences on aligning with CPs and to introduce and create a discussion platform with LA countries on the new areas of practice and IP system in which EU IPOs have further converged.

This activity aims to strengthen the Latin American IPO’s capacity to deal with new technologies (i.e. artificial intelligence) and to increase examiners’ efficiency in this area, as well as to improve their decision predictability for end-users.