The African Regional Intellectual Property Organization (ARIPO) and the Intellectual Property Rights and Innovation Project in Africa (AfrIPI) are hosting a Workshop on Integration and Implementation of Intellectual Property (IP) Tools for the ARIPO Member States on 21 and 22 June 2022. The workshop will take place at the ARIPO Secretariat in Harare, Zimbabwe.
At the workshop there will be at least two representatives from each of the following 23 countries: Angola, Botswana, Burundi, Cape Verde, The Gambia, Ghana, Kenya, Lesotho, Liberia, Malawi, Mozambique, Maurtitius, Namibia, Nigeria, Rwanda, Somalia, South Africa, Spain, Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.
In the last decade, the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) has worked very closely with the European Union’s Member State IP offices to develop IP tools that help make their work more efficient and which make IP information freely available to the public – openly and transparently. This workshop will share these tools with ARIPO Member States as well as its Observer and Potential Member States to demonstrate the positive impact of these tools in IP offices.
IP tools offer immediate tangible benefits to the users of the IP system in Africa, such as, among others, quality and reliability and access to information. At the same time, these tools generate efficiency gains for IP administrations and free up resources to expand the IP rights services offered.The workshop intends to establish a clear roadmap for implementing the IP tools that each office in the participating states would want to use. The tools set to be presented are TMview, DesignView, TMclass, DesignClass, the Common Examiner Support Tool (CESTO) and the e-filing system (linked with the Harmonised Database of Goods and Services). In addition, this workshop aims to initiate the integration of trade mark and design data from those African IP offices that are currently the most technically advanced, with those that are progressing towards that same end goal.“The workshop comes at a critical time when Member States are increasingly adopting various IP tools in their offices. This workshop will bring closer to home all the cumulative skillsets and IT tools that have been developed and perfected over time, used in European IP offices, and proven to bring positive results,” said Mr. Bemanya Twebaze, Director General of ARIPO.
“We are convened here for the next two days to learn and discuss the various intellectual property tools that will empower our offices and our countries. We will be introduced to a suite of virtual services and programs that can help us to better serve our stakeholders and clients while ensuring that our diverse communities overcome barriers to true participation in the 6th wave of innovation that we are currently in,” added Mr. Willie Mushayi, Chairperson, ARIPO Administrative Council.
