In 2007, Bush administration began negotiations on ACTA particularly to contain several developing countries engaged in piracy acts, and to protect the interests of leading US firms which lost their price competitiveness on account of counterfeiting. Incidentally, the ACTA effect will not be restricted to internet activities alone but extends to counterfeit pharmaceuticals, designer merchandise, music, movies, etc.

Surprisingly, the final draft will not have the endorsement of China, one of the largest counterfeit producers. Hence, looking back to past events on taking action against China in regards to infringements, the trade pact is expected to encounter similar stalemate while implementing a likely ratified deal. Participants in the negotiations included Australia, Canada, the European Union, represented by the European Commission, the European Union Presidency (Spain) and EU Member States, Japan, Korea, Mexico, Morocco, New Zealand, Singapore, Switzerland and the US.

Many ACTA dissidents blame the secretive or undemocratic nature of reaching the agreement by not revealing the details for public discussion. On the other hand, WIPO provides scope for public scrutiny with an added advantage of the inclusion of major counterfeiting countries in negotiations.

Meanwhile, the tech firms are understood to be apprehensive about ACTA’s secondary liability clause, which recommends the responsibility of copyright infringement behaviour of the user on the online service provider. The clause will possibly affect social networking sites, video-sharing sites and several other user-generated content sites including the online encyclopaedia, Wikipedia.

Last month, a statement signed by senior trade-union officials from New Zealand, Australia, Singapore and the US raised the question of intellectual property rights becoming an element in the free-trade negotiations. However that fear is put to rest by officials at the eighth round of ACTA negotiations calling the deal as a ‘standalone’ one, and would not tinker with FTAs.

According to sources, the draft will leave out three-strikes provision that would require border agents to search the contents of electronic devices. Experts term three-strikes a preposterous idea as it would virtually bring every transit cell to a standstill.

Toboc Trade News

Many species of popular aquarium fish come from West Africa, specifically from the Lower Guinean rain-forest in Cameroon, reported VOANews. Europe, the US and Japan are regarded as the largest importers of pet fishes.

The WFC has set up a network of fishing communities around the Southern and Central Cameroon, and imparted training programs to improve the handling of all kind of fishes. Subsequently, the centre ensured that the fishers in the ornamental fish industry received fair wages. Species such as the shimmering epiplatys, striped barbus jae and the red-toothed pungu are collected in streams and river basins with hand-held nets, and fishers received up to 20 cents for each fish.

Randall Brummett, a senior scientist in Cameroon with the WFC said he came up with the project after a veterinarian at Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris informed him that 90 percent of the pet fish shipments arrived dead. The project is understood to have overcome a major hurdle by extending the survival rate of the fish by 90 percent at the port of entry as against the two weeks’ shelf life of the aquarium companies of Cameroon.

However, he admitted that current storage facility, operated in conjunction with the sustainable aquarium fish company Gulf Aquatics was not big enough to hold the amount of fish supplied. He further added the WFC was trying to increase the storage facility to reach out to all remote rural communities in Cameroon to optimize their profits by getting rid of middlemen from the business process.

It has been understood that the project has yielded good results as many companies those paid lower wages have vanished from the markets owing to the WFC’s longer survival package. Brummett claimed “The fishers make about five or six times more than they used to, the main reason being that our survival rate is up to over 90 percent now.”

Toboc Trade News