National IP Strategy aims to make Brazil a world-class hub for innovation

The Intellectual Property Inter-Ministerial Group (GIPI), presided over by the Ministry of Economy, has created a National IP Strategy (ENPI), which is designed to improve the national IP system. The details of the draft strategy were worked out in partnership with WIPO. These latest efforts come further to initiatives already being implemented by the Brazil National Institute for Industrial Property (INPI) to cement its position as one of the world’s leading patent offices.

On 10 August 2020, a public consultation opened to receive comments and suggestions for the draft strategy. Less than a year later, on 9 June 2021, the GIPI finally approved the first action plan for implementing and monitoring it. ENPI is designed to establish an effective and broadly used national IP system, with the aim of stimulating innovation and improving access to knowledge for the benefit of all, as well as promoting competition and socio-economic development.

The strategy is designed to last for 10 years (2021 to 2030) and contains 210 actions, which are organised into seven main strategic areas, namely:

• intellectual property for competition and development;
• IP dissemination, training and qualification;
• governance and institutional strengthening;
• the modernisation of the legal frameworks and non-statutory instruments;
• compliance and legal certainty;
• intelligence and perspectives for the future; and
• plans to integrate Brazil into the global IP system.

The implementation plans will be renewed every two years, with the next due in 2023 to 2025.

Additionally, the GIPI has approved the selection of 10 civil society entities to support the implementation plans over the next 12 months.

The ENPI is part of an even broader strategy encompassed by the National Strategy of Innovation, which directly supports and contributes to its implementation. 

Since the approval of the first action plan, 73% of the planned actions are already being further developed and implemented, according to government data. INPI’s modernisation is as part of the ENPI and specific actions for this have already yielded significant results in terms of reducing the patent backlog by between 60% and 80%, lowering the time to grant IP rights, increasing priority examination modalities, as well as renewing INPI’s internal structure.

If all goes well, over the next decade Brazil is expected to be among the 10 countries with the highest number of IP protection requests. The ENPI initiative, along with current efforts to implement it, are a positive addition to the Brazilian innovation landscape and have the potential to help the country make significant strides in innovation.