PCT: Argentina, one step closer

Argentina is moving decisively towards accession to the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT). Everything suggests that, in the near future, the country will become a Contracting State.

On 26 August 2026, the Chamber of Deputies approved the bill enabling accession to the PCT. The text will now pass to the Senate for its final consideration.

The approval was granted with a reservation under Chapter II, as Uruguay did. This means that the International Preliminary Examination will not be binding on the Argentine Patent Office. In this way, the national authority will retain the power to apply its own criteria when assessing novelty, inventive step and industrial application during the national phase.

Regarding this reservation, Articles 1 and 64.1(a) of the bill approved on 26 August provide as follows:

Article 1: “The Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT), signed at Washington on 19 June 1970, amended on 28 September 1979 and modified on 3 February 1984 and 3 October 2001, is hereby approved, with a reservation under Chapter II as provided for in Article 64.1(a) of the Treaty.”

Article 64. “Reservations. 1)(a) Any State may declare that it shall not be bound by the provisions of Chapter II.”

The Chapter II Reservation under the PCT is counterbalanced by Resolution 56.

Resolution P-056/2016 as a mechanism equivalent to a PPH

Resolution P-056/2016 introduced into the Argentine patent system a mechanism equivalent to the so-called “Patent Prosecution Highway” (PPH), which allows the examination of patent applications in Argentina to be accelerated.

As we reported in our previous article, Resolution 142/2026 of the National Institute of Industrial Property (INPI), published in the Official Gazette on 13 May 2026, amended Resolution P-056/2016, significantly broadening access to the accelerated patent examination mechanism, provided that six conditions are met:

• That the priority application, or its equivalent, has been granted abroad.
• That the foreign office has examined novelty, inventive step and industrial application.
• That the scope of the claims in Argentina is equal to or narrower than those granted abroad.
• That there is no local prior art.
• That there is no intervening international prior art between the filing date of the equivalent patent and the effective filing date in Argentina.
• That the subject matter is patentable under Argentine law.

Once these requirements are met, the INPI would grant the patent. Resolution 56 may be invoked at any time while the application is pending, with the grant or refusal of the patent as the time limit.

This year, 2026, has been particularly active in legislative terms in Argentina. In March, the scope of patentable subject matter was broadened in Argentina, with wider acceptance of inventions in the pharmaceutical, biotechnological and agrochemical fields.

At Herrero & Asociados (H&A), we will be following the Senate’s decision on Argentina’s incorporation into the PCT very closely.