EUIPO, as the implementing agency for the “Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) Action for Africa” (AfrIPI) project, funded by the European Union, has provided legal support to the filing of Penja Pepper (Cameroon) Protected Geographical Indication (PGI) application in Europe.

This activity enhanced the capacity of the productive sector in African countries to compete in external markets through the use of protected GIs to identify the origin of their products.

On 7 and 8 May 2020, EUIPO, in collaboration with OAPI, delivered a 2-day online training session to the students of the OAPI – University of Yaoundé II – 2020 Master's Program on Intellectual Property.

The sessions focused on different topics, being one of them the presentation of a case recently decided by the Court of Justice of the European Union that deals with the level of protection of a GI in the form of a collective mark.

EUIPO, as the implementing agency for the “Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) Action for Africa” project (AfrIPI), funded by the European Union, is currently developing a Manual on African Geographical Indications (in English and French), containing the following information:

On 15 June 2020, Tete Goat (Cabrito de Tete) was registered as a Geographical Indication in Mozambique, with the support of WIPO and FAO. It is the first GI registered at an ARIPO member state.

The African Union Commission and the European Commission co-hosted the 3rd AU EU Agriculture Ministerial Conference, which was held in the FAO premises in Rome on the 21st June 2019.

The approximately 450 invitees, comprising of high-level representatives, stakeholders from Africa and Europe, engaged in discussions on how to realize the potential for sustainable and inclusive rural and agricultural development.

The importance of the contribution of GIs to sustainable development in Africa was underlined during a two-day round table organised jointly by OAPI, ARIPO and WIPO in Yaoundé, on “Geographical Indications in Africa: Challenges of Territorial Development, Economic Integration and Trade”. Participants recognised the need to put in place national provisions to develop protection and enhancement systems for GIs.

As one of the three pilot projects for the development and protection of GIs in Africa, the Consultative Committee for the Continental Strategy for Geographical Indications is launching the mock-up of the future Pan African Geographical Indications information hub. This would enable the visualisation, probing and testing of the functionality of the platform to be developed in the future, before it made accessible to the general public.