The Protracted WTO Battle over a Multilateral GI Register: What Lies Beneath?

Abstract

The November 2014 breakthrough on the Trade Facilitation Agreement might have gone some way in infusing a new lease of life to the WTO as an institution, the same can hardly be said for most of the other Doha Round issues that still appear to be trapped in a blind alley. The issue of the creation of a multilateral register of Geographical Indications (GIs) for wines and spirits is one such area. Despite several years of wrangling, arriving at a landing zone on this issue still appears to be a far-fetched dream, if the mood expressed by the WTO Members in the December 2014 informal meeting on the multilateral register is anything to go by! Written against this backdrop, the present article has two objectives. First, it makes an attempt to trace the historical, legal as well as economic reasons underlying the protracted debates on GIs under the WTO and beyond – which have widely been referred to as one between the ‘Old World’ (e.g., the EU, Switzerland) and the ‘New World’ (e.g., the US, Australia, Canada, Argentina, Chile, etc.). Second, the article provides a snapshot of the long-drawn WTO negotiations on the multilateral register for wines and spirits under the Doha Round.