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of the industrialized countries have introduced patents legislations after they have reached a certain level of technological competence and international competence. For example, when “the United States was still a relatively young and developing country… it refused to respect international intellectual property rights on the grounds that it was freely entitled to foreign works to further its social and economic development.” (Office of Technology Assessment, 1986)

Does favored policy and laws imply rapid industrialization for developing countries?

Technological learning was supposed to bring rapid industrialization for developing countries by providing them with more flexible and favored policies and laws (including parallel imports, compulsory licensing and exclusion from patentability for certain class of technologies) (Kim, L 1997). For example, the Berne convention for Protection of Literary and Artistic Works was revised in 1971 to include a “Special Provision for Developing Countries” clause. This should “grant non-exclusive, non transferable licenses to its nationals for the reproduction or translation of foreign-owned copyright works for educational or research purposes.” This additional section had the purpose to promote public interest.

However, it was noted that the developing countries were not able to benefit from the special provision of the Berne convention to grant copyright to these countries. This was because of the difficulties that were associated with compulsory licensing as a means of development policy instrument. The developing countries do not have the requisite competences to use these patented technology unless they are given the support (both financial and technical support) on how to use them to their benefits.

Moreover, enforcement of intellectual property rights and meeting technological needs of the developing countries have become subject for debates in the Uruguay Round negotiations. Article 8 of the TRIPs reflects the debate and stipulates that countries “may, in the formulating or amending their laws and regulations, adopt measures necessary to protect public health and nutrition, and to promote the public interest in sectors of vital importance to their socio – economic and technological development, provided that such measures are consistent with the provisions of this Agreement.” Article 8 continues by giving the liberty to the countries to adopt the measure that “may be needed to prevent the abuse of intellectual property rights by right holders or to resort to practices which unreasonably restrain trade or adversely affect the international transfer of technology”. (WTO 1999)

Therefore in order to adopt the flexibility granted by in the Article 8 of the TRIPs Agreement successfully would depend on

The formulation of their interests through national policy and legislations and implementing these laws (for which they have a limited implementation period of only 5 years – see Section 3.3.1 below)

The relationship between the developing countries and its major trading partners in the industrialized world, because the right holder of the inventions and technological advances and concepts are those industrialized countries. This might be difficult were the developing countries would primarily sought to protect their technology than exporting them to the developing countries, as these advances are the