this regime can be consistent with the trips agreement as will be explained below it should also be noted that a totally free market policy towards new uses risks significantly lessening the incentive to explore such uses even for potential local producers for this and other reasons we shall also discuss other means of protection that offer an alternative to patents that developing countries might find particularly wellsuited to promoting investment in the discovery of new uses of known pharmaceutical substances as will be further described below the manner in which governments implement the options available under the trips agreement will determine both the extent to which the originator patentee will have control over new uses and the space available for followon innovators including local companies to produce the product in question for such uses the first concerns the extent to which trips obliges countries to protect new uses of known substances at all as a technical legal matter if the trips agreement does not include such a requirement the second question concerns the benefits and detriments of choosing whether or not to protect new uses of known substances