THE Administrative Council of the African Regional Intellectual Property Organisation (Aripo), a continental organisation dealing with administration of property rights, is holding a conference in Victoria Falls with an objective of coming up with ways of curbing poverty in Africa.
Ruth Ngwenya Own correspondent
Speaking at the official opening of the conference, Justice, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs deputy minister Fortune Chasi said Aripo was a premier intellectual property organisation, which should be able to give guidance to governments so as to encourage innovation.
“It is, therefore, necessary to reflect on what needs to be done to ensure that Aripo has required capacity to play such a leading role,” he said.
Chasi said agriculture remained one of the central economic activities in African countries and Aripo had come up with a draft framework for protection of new plant varieties.
“This is a welcome development as it will help to ensure that we promote and incentivise our plant breeders to be able to propagate new plant varieties that can withstand drought, resist diseases and produce high yields and, therefore, ultimately enhancing food security on the continent,” he said.
“We do not want small-scale farmers to fall victim to an unfriendly system — peasant farming is still widespread economic activity in most African States within Aripo.”
Aripo is an African inter-governmental organisation with a membership of 19 English-speaking countries. The 38th session of Aripo comes at a time when the African continent is faced with climate change issues, which affect agriculture and cause perennial poverty.
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Aripo director-general Fernando dos Santos said they had agreed to hold a diplomatic conference next year to establish a regional system for new plant varieties to improve yields.
“Africa faces drought challenges with climate change being one of the chief causes and we have to come up with alternative ways of dealing with the problem,” he said.
During the conference, member states are expected to come up with the organisation’s 2015 budget and to review 2014 activities.
