Tim Roberts Council Member

Member of the Biotechnology Committee, Computer Technology Committee, Patents Committee, Constitutional Committee (Chairman), Finance & House Committee, Textbooks & Publications Committee, and the Parliamentary Committee.

Roberts & Co., 13 Spring Meadow, Bracknell, Berks RGl2 2JP..

M.A Oxon (Chemistry). Registered October 1964.

Professional career: Joined ICI Plastics Division December 1960; Head, Patents Section, Plant Protection Limited (ICI subsidiary), August 1966, and subsequently Patents Manager, ICI Plant Protection Division. Intellectual Property Manager, Zeneca Seeds, January l 987 to December 1995.

Papers or articles: Has lectured, on behalf of WIPO, UPOV, WTO and others, in five continents on biotech. patents and on plant variety rights. Articles include ‘Broad Claims’ (European Intellectual Property Review [EIPR], August 1994; ‘The Former Biotech Patents Directive’ (Patents World, May 1995), ‘Patenting Plants around the World’ (EIPR, October 1996), ‘Paper, Scissors, Stone’ (EIPR, March 1998), ‘Why not Patent Plants?’ (Patents World, May 1999) and ‘Economically Superfluous, Physically Pernicious…. ?’, a review of the Nuffield Report on GM Crops (Bio-Science Law Review, March 2000).

Services to Institute: President, 2001-02; Council Member since 1994; former Chairman of Biotechnology, Parliamentary and Textbooks Committees; Editor, European Patents Handbook. Has written ‘Council News’; articles and reviews in CIPA (e.g. ‘To Entertain Unnatural Mice...') and lectured for CIPA to the 3rd and 5th International Symposia on reducing patent costs.

Services to the profession outside the Institute: Former Slough Course tutor. Serves (or served) on Biotech Committees of TMPDF, ICC Intellectual Property Commission (Rapporteur) and on IP Working Parties of British Society of Plant Breeders, International Seed Federation and Green Industry Biotechnology Platform. Represented ICC at negotiations leading to 1991 UPOV Convention.

Other relevant information: Biodiversity interests; took part in the Keystone Dialogue on Plant Genetic Resources (final Report, Oslo, 1991). In 1997-98, chaired an international expert Panel on Proprietary Science and Technology, set up by the World Bank to advise the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) on its intellectual property policy. Member of UK Government's Intellectual Property Advisory Committee (2001-2005); Panel Member of the Appeal Board of the European Plant Variety Rights Office; and member of the Crucible Group (‘People, Plants and Patents’, IDRC, 1994; ‘Seeding Solutions’, IDRC/Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation, 2000).