Sri Lanka to Bid for Exclusive Rights on ‘Ceylon Tea’

By Phillip Hogan
December 30th, 2009

Posted in Intl Tea Trade, Tea in the News

Sri Lanka looks set to secure a claim, under the current World Trade Organisation’s (WTO) Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS), for Geographical Indicators (GI) to protect the prestigious wording: ‘Ceylon Tea’.

The country already has existing rights, under intellectual property rights laws, that protects the phrase ‘Pure Ceylon Tea’ and the iconic lion logo from unauthorised use. The existing law currently covers 60 countries but has to be registered in each country before copyright is assured.

The appeal of the GI system, if Sri Lanka’s bid is successful, is that any product registered under GI status immediately benefits from copyright protection in all of the WTO’S 150 member countries.

The benefits are self-evident, demonstrated by products such as Melton Mowbray Pork Pies and wines from the Champagne region of France.

Seven key production regions are included in Sri Lanka’s bid for GI status; Nuwara Eliya, Dimbula, Uva, Udapusellawa, Kandy, Ruhuna and Sabaragamuwa.

With production costs at an all time high, Sri Lanka’s bid is aimed at combating the current trend of price-cutting.

Price competition is severely damaging the countries tea industry which cannot compete with the other dominant tea producers in the global trade.

Sri Lanka produces very high quality tea and this comes at a cost. The cost of production of tea in Sri Lanka is roughly US$ 1.75 per kilogram, compared with India’s US$ 1.25 per kilogram, Kenya’s US$ 1.00 per kilogram and Vietnam’s much lower cost of US$ 0.75 per kilogram.

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Posted in ceylon tea , TRIPS , WTO

WTO holds first Ministerial meeting in four years

(November 30, 2009) The World Trade Organisation (WTO) begins its first ministerial meeting in four years Monday aimed at reviewing the work of the 153-member group.

While trade negotiations are not on the agenda of the three-day gathering in Geneva, the stalled global trade round is likely to play a major role, following a call by world leaders for an agreement on the issue by the end of 2010.

Instead of considering a trade deal, WTO chief Pascal Lamy sees the meeting as providing “a platform for ministers to review the functioning of this house”.

Security barriers have been erected around the conference venue and police reinforcements have been called in from other parts of Switzerland amid concerns about demonstrators attempting to disrupt the meeting.

An anti-capitalist protest in Geneva Saturday erupted into violence, with cars set alight and shop windows smashed.

The meeting in Switzerland comes a decade after a WTO ministerial meeting in Seattle aimed at driving forward global free trade was engulfed by violent protests.

This week’s conference is being held amid signs that global trade is recovering from its biggest contraction since the Great Depression.

The WTO member states represent about 95 percent of total global trade. Ministers last met 2005 in Hong Kong. A gathering scheduled for 2007 was postponed because of lack of progress on the trade round launched in Doha in 2001.

-The Hindu

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Posted in Anand Sharma , Geneva , global trade , Ministerial meeting , Pascal Lamy , World Trade Organisatio , WTO , WTO chief