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Regime Tension In The Intellectual Property Rights Arena: Farmers' Rights And Post-Trips Counter Regime Trends, Chidi Oguamanam

Dalhousie Law Journal

Recognizing the transitions that have occurred in the global intellectual property arena since the TRIPS Agreement, this article identifies and examines key sites of the counter regime trends in intellectual property rights with a focus on farmers' rights. It invokes farmers' rights to highlight the conceptual and juridicalhurdles facing the new issue-linkages that propel attempts to redress the shortcomings of the TRIPS' trade-centred approach to intellectual property. The author argues that the existingjuridical framework for farmers 'rights,especiallyunder the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (ITPGRFA), although inchoate, is stymied and not competent to realize the expectations …