Inventions and patenting in Africa: Empirical trends from 1970 to 2010

• Published date: 01 March 2020
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/jwip.12139
• Author: Gregory D. Graff,Philip G. Pardey
• Date: 01 March 2020

© 2019 The Authors. The Journal of World Intellectual Property published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd

J World Intellect Prop. 2020;23:40–64.40

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wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/jwip

DOI: 10.1111/jwip.12139

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

Inventions and patenting in Africa: Empirical

trends from 1970 to 2010

Gregory D. Graff

1,2,3

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Philip G. Pardey

3,4

1

Department of Agricultural and Resource

Economics, Colorado State University, Fort

Collins, Colorado

2

Department of Technology Management and

Economics, Chalmers University of

Technology, Gothenburg, Sweden

3

International Science and Technology

Practice and Policy (InSTePP), University of

Minnesota, St. Paul, Minnesota

4

Department of Applied Economics,

University of Minnesota, St. Paul, Minnesota

Correspondence

Gregory D. Graff, Department of Agricultural

and Resource Economics, Colorado State

University, B328 Andrew G. Clark Building,

1200 Center Avenue Mall, Fort Collins,

CO 80523‐1172.

Email: gregory.graff@colostate.edu

Funding information

Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation; U.S.

National Institutes of Health

Abstract

Economic development is increasingly dependent upon on

utilizing new knowledge to innovate and create value, even

in traditional industries and in low‐income countries. This

analysis uses evidence on patent families to assess innova-

tion activity throughout sub‐Saharan Africa. We find patent

activity in sub‐Saharan Africa—both by African inventors

and by foreign inventors—is comparable to similar regions

around the world, when conditioned on economic size.

Patent filings in Africa have grown, particularly, since the

mid‐1990s, but at different rates within different African

jurisdictions. Types of technologies being patented in Africa

have remained stable over 30 years, with most in pharma-

ceuticals, chemistry, biotechnology, and engineering. The

majority of patent filings in Africa are from Europe, the

United States, and other high income countries. Yet, in South

Africa, between 15% and 20% of patent filings are by

residents of South Africa, and 3% are from other developing

and emerging economies. Only a small share of inventions

globally are made in sub‐Saharan Africa, but for those

inventions that do arise in Africa, foreign filings are made

widely outside of Africa.

KEYWORDS

Africa, intellectual property rights, international technology trans-

fer, patent families, patent offices

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This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and

reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

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INTRODUCTION

The world’s first patent statute—adopted in the city‐state of Venice in 1474—was an early preindustrial economic

development policy. By contrast, the globalized patent system of today may seem far removed from the economic

development goals of low‐and middle‐income countries, such as those of sub‐Saharan Africa (hereafter,

interchangeably as Africa). This is due, in large part, to the increasing asymmetry in technological capabilities that

have grown, since the Industrial Revolution, between inventors in leading industrialized countries and technological

followers in all other countries. Yet, economic development is increasingly a question of utilizing knowledge to

innovate, solve problems, and create value, even in traditional industries and even in least‐developed countries.

This is evidenced by the contributions of new knowledge—in the form of vaccines, improved crop varieties, or

mobile telephone and data services—to the livelihoods of millions. Innovation has played an important role in

meeting several of the Millennium Development Goals, and the need for further innovation is integral to the

framing of the Sustainable Development Goals (United Nations, 2017).

Scholars and policymakers are divided on the role of patents in economic development policy (Barton et al.,

2002; Maskus, 2000; Siebeck, Evenson, Lesser, & Primo Braga, 1990). The negotiation, adoption, and

implementation of common minimum standards under the Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS)

agreement as part of the World Trade Organization (WTO) Treaty provided ample context for this debate over the

past three decades (Blakeney & Mengistie, 2011; Diwan & Rodrik, 1991), yet it is a debate that has run for far

longer (May & Sell, 2006).

Some argue that intellectual property rights (IPRs) in developing countries are counterproductive to economic

development. The first and strongest argument in this vein is based on the observation that, since more applications

come from inventors in high‐income countries, a developing country’s patent system is most likely to issue patent

rights to foreigners. Therefore, a stronger patent system serves mainly to transfer wealth from domestic consumers

to inventors in high‐income countries (Maskus, 2000).

The second argument against patents is related to the first, but focuses on domestic producers, holding that

stronger patent regimes in developing countries create difficult conditions for domestic industry to compete

against global technological leaders. Under a weaker patent regime, developing‐country firms have greater freedom

to imitate technologies invented in wealthier countries. The developing‐country imitators can then move, at lower

cost, through the crucial phases of catching up to the global technological frontier. Once they have caught up, it is

conceded, IPRs can then be accordingly strengthened. This pattern, it is argued, has been followed repeatedly in

history, first by firms in Germany and the United States catching up to those in Britain and France in 19th century,

and successively by firms in Japan, Korea, and most recently in China catching up to those in the West.

A third major argument against patents in developing countries has focused on humanitarian issues of access to

technologies that meet fundamental human needs, such as food security and essential medicines (Gold & Lam,

2003; Kapczynski, Chaifetz, Katz, & Benkler, 2005; Orsi, Camara, & Coriat, 2006). Stronger patent regimes in

developing countries, it is argued, tend to increase prices of food and medicines, particularly for the poorest of

consumers for whom these categories make up a large share of typical household budgets. Furthermore, agriculture

and health‐care represent some of the most widespread forms of economic activity in developing countries: with

large segments of the population deriving their livelihoods from smallholder agriculture and with malnutrition,

poverty, and infectious disease creating disproportionate public health and economic burdens. In sub‐Saharan

Africa, such conditions certainly are observed, and, for example, high profile objections erupted in South Africa in

the late 1990s regarding patents on antiretroviral human immunodeficiency virus drugs (Fisher & Rigamonti, 2005;

Ostergard, 1999).

Other scholars caution, however, that developing‐country policymakers should not too‐readily neglect patent

systems, given the increasingly important role that knowledge plays in economic growth. Foremost, it is countered,

under a weak patent system domestic industry, entrepreneurs, or publicly funded researchers choose not to invest

resources in innovative effort, given the lack of incentives from the lack of domestic protections

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