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Perry, Mark --- "From Pasteur to Monsanto: Approaches to Patenting Life in Canada" [2008] ELECD 365; in Gendreau, Ysolde (ed), "An Emerging Intellectual Property Paradigm" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2008)

Book Title: An Emerging Intellectual Property Paradigm

Editor(s): Gendreau, Ysolde

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781847205971

Section: Chapter 4

Section Title: From Pasteur to Monsanto: Approaches to Patenting Life in Canada

Author(s): Perry, Mark

Number of pages: 14

Extract:

4. From Pasteur to Monsanto: approaches
to patenting life in Canada
Mark Perry1

BACKGROUND
Few would dispute that one of the main rationales of all patent regimes is to
encourage the development of new `inventions', to promote innovation by
direct reward (the grant of the monopoly from the state), and to ensure the
dissemination of information required to stimulate further invention.2 It is
usually stated from the utilitarian perspective by the courts:3

There is no doubt that two of the central objects of the Patent Act are `to advance
research and development and to encourage broader economic activity'.

It is notable that the Canadian courts are recently giving recognition to the
wider theoretical basis for the state granting Intellectual Property rights to
inventors, authors, and traders, in particular the sense that there are balancing
`user rights' for the consumers and the users of the material protected by intel-
lectual property rights.4 In the realm of biotechnology, however, there have
been some problems in the application of these tenets, whether the new or the
old. The objective of promoting innovation has been met with the denial of


1 Many thanks to Stephanie Sutherland (Law Class of 2008) and Jennifer
Hoffman (Law Class of 2009) for their diligent assistance, and to the Law Foundation
for their support. However, all errors and omissions are my own.
2 Graeme W. Austin, `Copyright's Modest Ontology ­ Theory and Pragmatism
in Eldred v. Ashcroft' (2003) 16:2 Canadian Journal of Law and Jurisprudence ...