Report of the Twelfth Meeting of the CGIAR Private Sector Committee

Report of the twelfth meeting of the CGIAR Private Sector Committee, held in Dresden, Germany just prior to the CGIAR Mid Term Meeting 2000, Chairman Sam Dryden presiding. The Committee met separately with the CGIAR Chairman and the TAC Chairman.The discussion was devoted largely to the TAC vision paper and its companion paper on priority research and related activity themes. The Committee encouraged proposals for development of a framework for project portfolio management, formation of technology partnerships with advanced research institutions, regional approaches to research planning, and the establishment of an independent body to handle intellectual property issues.Dryden reported on an international forum organized by CIMMYT in Tlaxcala, Mexico on making proprietary technologies available to subsistence farmers. Other topics were forms of possible interaction between the private sector and the CGIAR, and methods of diversifying the public discussion of biotechnology and its application to developing countries.