In the News

Managing IP in Health and Agricultural Innovation

Intellectual Property Management in Health and Agricultural Innovation: A Handbook of Best Practices, released in May, is a joint publication of the U.K.'s Centre for the Management of Intellectual Property in Health Research and Development (MIHR) and Public Intellectual Property Resource in Agriculture (PIPRA). Written by practitioners in the field, its 153 chapters aim to provide a comprehensive resource on current IP management issues and approaches, with strategies for utilizing the power of both IP and the public domain. The book illustrates how IP can be leveraged judiciously to forge stronger partnerships and usher in a new age of collaboration and sharing.

Lita Nelsen, head of technology transfer for MIT and one of the editors of the two volume work, describes it as "the how-to manual for using the tool of IP," geared toward two distinct audiences: research institutions and technology transfer operations in developing countries; and first world institutions, "to make sure that they consider the needs of developing countries when they license important IP in medicines, vaccines, and foods, and do it right."

The MIHR, a not-for-profit organization, seeks to foster innovative practices in the ethical stewardship of IP for the social and economic benefit of developing countries. It has created regional networks of professionals engaged in technology transfer, and has been involved in developing technology transfer management skills in more than 200 institutions in Sub-Saharan Africa, India and Southeast Asia. In industrialized countries, MIHR promotes the use of IP tools for "humanitarian licensing" to help technologies reach impoverished populations.

Kenya signs Biodiversity Deal with Novozymes

The Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) and Novozymes, a Danish biotech company, announced in June that they had signed a five-year agreement on biological diversity, in line with the principles of the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity.

Novozymes and KWS will embark on a collaborative project to characterize Kenyan microbial diversity from specific biological niches. As part of the project Novozymes will train Kenyan students in taxonomy, isolation and identification of...