Latin American Firms Seek Strategy Against USA

ALIFAR, the Latin American pharmaceutical industry association thatrepresents the region's national companies, was to seek a common strategy against the "persistent threat of trade sanctions" from the USA in relation to the modernizing of intellectual property legislation, at its annual meeting, taking place last week in Quito, Ecuador, as the Marketletter went to press.

The association says that in the frontline are Argentina, Ecuador and Paraguay, countries which in April went to the top of the US blacklist of "patent pirates."

Host country Ecuador is currently being threatened with denial of preferential trade tariffs with the USA if by September it has not ratified a bilateral agreement on intellectual property. The deal was originally drawn up by former president Sixto Duran Ballen, but has since been thrown out by the current president, Abdala Bucaram, and by the present parliament.