Today's quote is from a letter to the Director General of the World Intellectual Property Organization, Francis Gurry, and deals with an effort within WIPO to expand the use of Geographical Indications in global commerce.  The intended instrument for doing this is the Lisbon Agreement, which is administered by WIPO.  As you will see from the list above, the letter was signed by the chairmen and ranking members of four key Congressional committees: the Senate Finance Committee, the House Ways and Means Committee, the Senate Judiciary Committee, and the House Judiciary Committee.
  
As a rule, we try to choose TTALK Quotes that are reasonably clear on their own, and in one sense this one fits that pattern.  The Congressional leaders who wrote to Director General Gurry last month are concerned about legal changes on the horizon that could hurt American producers.  No exegesis needed.  In another sense, however, the picture is a little hazy - at least it was for us - because two of the key entities here are not ones we know well or talk about often.  They are WIPO and the Lisbon Agreement. 

WIPO is the World Intellectual Property Organization.  Created in 1967, WIPO describes itself as "the global forum for intellectual property services, policy, information and cooperation."  Of the UN's 193 members, 188 are members of WIPO.  As you can learn from a quick glance at the WIPO website, the scope of its activities is broad indeed, and includes administering some 26 separate treaties.  One of those is the Lisbon treaty.

The Lisbon Agreement for the Protection of Appellations of Origin and Their International Registration dates back to 1958, though it didn't come into force until 1966.   It has 28 members.   This treaty has been revised in the past, and an effort is underway to revise it further by extending its provisions to geographical indications.
 
So much for brief definitions.  The next big event in the effort to bring GIs into the Lisbon agreement is this Geneva conference in mid-May:

The description is from the WIPO website.  The concern expressed by the Congressional leaders is twofold.  It is procedural in the sense that those WIPO members, like the United States, who are not parties to the Lisbon Agreement will apparently not have full participatory rights at this diplomatic conference.  The second is substantive.  They see threats to U.S. agriculture in this proposed expansion of the Lisbon Agreement. 

We begin with speech. GIs may be but symbols, but speech is what we are talking about.  We wish we were still young and innocent where speech is concerned.  We like to think of it as a neutral - and sometimes delightful - means of conveying information.  (The book is on the table... etc.)  Indeed, it was delightful speech that introduced us to some of its evildoers. The prime example here was "that dreadful Hungarian," the fictional Zoltan Kaparthy in My Fair Lady, whom Henry Higgins described as

Alas we are grown up now.  We live in a world of political correctness and competitive versions thereof, and we know that a very large chunk of life is taken up with the battle over words.  Much of the rest is about money.  And GIs are a battle about both, words and money.

We are not sure where all of this is going.  But two things are clear.  First, those favoring greater use of, and deference to, geographical indications - primarily the European Union - have been astonishingly successful, both in bilateral agreements and in other arenas, such as WIPO.

Second, this story is far from over.  Agreements involving the U.S., like the hoped for Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement, may take this contest in a different direction.  Whatever comes out of TPP, if the U.S. continues to suffer market losses as a result rule changes favoring GIs, U.S. producers and their representatives will ultimately look for other means of dealing with the situation.  They might, for example, consider a nullification and impairment case in the WTO, GATT Article XXIII, against a relevant country. We have no idea whether anyone will explore that avenue.  We are pretty sure, however, this issue will be around for a while.

On March 18 at the National Press Club  ...

This GBD event will run from 9 a.m. to 10:30 a.m. next Wednesday morning, with speakers from USTR, industry, Capitol Hill, and the European Union.  Click the title link above for registration options and other details.