Dear all,

We had a meeting with the Minister’s adviser yesterday (Irmi Salzer - Christoph she knows you from the LLD meeting in Graz a few years ago). A few interesting points:

The Austrian Patent Office (who did not attend the meeting but the President had briefed the adviser beforehand) had already received the NPOS letter from the EPO and analysed our demands. I am trying to get hold of the full legal analysis, but the summary was:

It would in theory be possible for the Admin Council to agree to the wording we have proposed, but it would have no legal effect. (I raised here that it would however have a political effect so it is not to be fully dismissed.) They consider there is already a consensus among the states that random mutagenesis is not a technical process (she specifically used the word technical) but the EPA handles it differently. They are also of the view that the Admin Council has no legal possibility to amend the temporal applicability of the EBA’s decision.

The Austrian position – they say it is the “most radical” of all the contracting states – remains that there should be no patents on conventional breeding and that full legal certainty can only be achieved by a chance of the European Patent Convention. (It was therefore deliberate that the Minister said this in her press release following the EBA decision.)

In terms of next steps:

1. The adviser invited us to suggest what mandate / direction the Minister should give Austrian Patent Office for the meeting on June 30^th.

2. She raised the possibility that the Minister could write to the Green Ministers with whom she has a good contact asking for their support: Sweden, Luxemburg, Finland. (Did I however remember rightly that the Scandinavians are not helpful?) Or perhaps there could be some joint initiative with  Germany?

We are reflecting now on both points but I would be grateful for any thoughts / comments.

Best

Katherine

Katherine Dolan

ARCHE NOAH Leitung Politik / Head of Policy

+43 (0)676 557 4408

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