World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Director General Francis Gurry said in the Global Think Tank Summit in Beijing that currently there were great opportunities for innovation in aspects of green technology and alternative energy resources that can serve the sustainable economic development of international community. IPR can play an important role in this regard. Some countries and regions had already set expressways for IPR application regarding clean technology and alternative energy resources.

Mr. Gurry expressed that many countries had already saw the surge of the need for IPR prior to financial crisis. There were 1.7 million patent applications all over the world annually and 1/4 of the applications to the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) came from Northwest Asia. The number isstill  growing further each year.

Mr. Gurry reviewed that there were differences in patent conducts among different regions of the world. Statistics show a 14% decrease in the U.S. and a 19% increase in China about PCT application number. This showed that the financial crisis affected different countries and regions differently on their innovation.