WIPO Intellectual Property, Genetic Resources and Traditional Knowledge Treaty: Unravelling the United States’ Isolationist Intellectual Property Diplomacy

Intellectual Property Forum
(March 2026)

Chidi Oguamanam

This article is published on Intellectual Property Forum, Issue 143, March 2026. Read it here. 

There are many perspectives on the two-and-a-half-decade journey leading to the WIPO Treaty on Genetic Resources and Associated Traditional Knowledge (GR-ATK Treaty) adopted by the World Intellectual Property Organization in 2024. The Treaty is both a symbolic and milestone instrument. It is the first document of treaty status to interface Traditional Knowledge with the global intellectual property (IP) system, especially the patent regime.

In this paper, I explore a rarely acknowledged perspective: the strategic and consistent bridge- and confidence-building role of Australia and New Zealand that proved critical to the making of the Treaty. As members of Group B (industrialized countries), Australia and New Zealand have strong national political, cultural, and economic interests in Traditional Knowledge. That interest placed them in a nuanced tension of sorts with the United States, a staunch member of the Group and a historical ally.

Find out how the duo deployed their deft diplomatic skills, and one of the inadvertent consequences of that effort: the further unmasking of the United States’ isolationist diplomacy around intellectual property and Traditional Knowledge

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