Intellectual Property Office-Philippines Gains Access to Indian Digital Library of Traditional Medicine Systems
Philippine Ambassador to India Josel F. Ignacio exchanges copies of the Access Agreement with Dr. Sattigeri of CSIR’s TKDL Unit. With them are Third Secretary Telan and Shri Kumar. (New Delhi PE photo)
NEW DELHI 31 January 2025 — The Intellectual Property Office of the Philippines (IPOPHL) joined the growing number of national patent offices across the world on 24 January 2025 to have exclusive access to India’s digital repository of its traditional medical systems, with the conclusion of the requisite agreement between the two countries this month.
Established in 2001 as a joint project of India’s Council of Scientific & Industrial Research (CSIR) and Department of Ayurveda, Yoga and Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homeopathy (AYUSH), the Traditional Knowledge Digital Library (TKDL) houses an extensive body of information on medicinal plants and formulations used in traditional Indian medicine systems.
Currently, the TKDL database boasts of about 515,000 formulations and practices from Ayurveda, Unani, Siddha, Yoga and Sowa Rigpa. Efforts are ongoing to include traditional Indian agricultural and metallurgical knowledge into the library.
Finalized on 20 January this year, the Access Agreement with the CSIR allows the IPOPHL to access information for effectively assessing patent applications involving traditional Indian systems, and forestalling the faulty or erroneous grant of patents.
At ceremonies held at the CSIR’s New Delhi headquarters, Philippine Ambassador to India Josel F. Ignacio and CSIR’s TKDL Unit Chief Dr. Viswajanani J Sattigeri presided over the ceremonial exchange of copies of the Access Agreement.
With the agreement, IPOPHL joins the ranks of the patent offices of 16 other countries with such arrangements with CSIR. Auspiciously, the conclusion and ceremonial exchange of the IPOPHL-CSIR agreement coincided with rites commemorating the 25th year of the TKDL.
With the Ambassador was Embassy Economic Officer (Third Secretary) Melissa Anne M. Telan and Attaché Rina Isabel P. de Chavez.
Gracing the event were former Secretary of the Indian Ministry of Health and Family Dr. Shailaja Chandra, former CSIR Director General Dr. Raghunath A Mashelkar, Ministry of AYUSH Secretary Vd. Rajesh Kotecha, Additional Secretary Himani Pande of the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT), and current CSIR Director General Dr. N. Kalaiselvi. END
Ambassador Ignacio with Dr. Sattigeri. (New Delhi PE photo)
Ambassador Ignacio and Third Secretary Melissa Anne M. Telan with CSIR Officials on-stage at the event. (New Delhi PE photo)
For more information, visit https://www.newdelhipe.dfa.gov.ph, https://twitter.com/PHinIndia https://www.instagram.com/phinindia or https://www.facebook.com/Philippine-Embassy-in-India-348528665275556/.