Looking to nature for drug research, genetically modified crops or other products, is nothing new — research groups and major corporations are major explorers in this field. But discoveries based on traditional Indigenous knowledge or the wealth of biodiversity in developing countries can end up being exported and patented without permits, credits or compensation known as biopiracy.
History of Biopiracy
The practice is rooted in history. Spanish colonisers, the United Kingdom and other global empires frequently took and profited from natural resource extraction in regions that they occupied, trading in products like coffee, cotton, tea, pepper and rubber. Today, richer states often exploit the natural resources of poorer nations for their medicinal, agricultural or industrial purposes. Though some protections have been in place for decades — including a World Trade Organization agreement that covers intellectual property rights for varieties of plants and animals — such permits aren’t always enough.
Such was in the case in the decade-long fight against a patent granted to a US multinational on an antifungal product derived from the neem tree, a traditional part of Indian medicinal knowledge. The case was ultimately won by the Indian government. Or when American cosmetics firm Mary Kay tried to patent an ingredient from the Kakadu plum — a native Australian fruit which can go for up to $AUS 40 ($27/€26) a kilogram — in its skincare line. The move would have shut out Indigenous producers from the Australian market, people who have long benefited from the plum’s medicinal qualities.
Biopiracy can also have devastating environmental effects. In Sri Lanka, for example, endemic fish and floral species are threatened — and by extension, the country’s diverse ecosystem — due to overexploitation by the ornamental fish and pharmaceutical industries.
Why is biopiracy an issue?
International deliberations on the issue of biopiracy has negotiators struggling to agree on updated terms that include issues like biopiracy and would account for recent scientific advances. The Nagoya Protocol, intended to regulate access to biodiversity and genetic resources and promote the “fair and equitable” sharing of any benefits with the communities that provide them, entered into force in October 2014. To date, 137 countries have ratified the document — though several major players are still absent, including Canada, the United States and Russia.
A major sticking point now is the use of genetic data in digital form, or digital sequence information (DSI). While traditional biopiracy — the illegal use of physical specimens — is protected in some form, a group of mainly African countries has insisted it will only agree to the new global biodiversity framework if it includes a way to fairly share the benefits from the use of DSI.
What do the experts say on biopiracy?
Rik Kutsch Lojenga, executive director of the international non-profit Union for Ethical BioTrade, told DW that digital sequence information can now be stored in online open-access databases, giving researchers what they need without having to directly handle the physical specimen. Lojenga said developing countries have expressed concern that this approach “would circumvent the obligation to share benefits from the utilization of genetic resources” under the Nagoya Protocol.
“The use of digital resources turns out to be more ‘subtle’ than in the case of ‘classic’ biopiracy,” said Michele Rivasi, a French member of the European Parliament with the Greens/European Free Alliance. She told DW that some researchers are now aiming to collect as many sequences as possible for their “huge databases,” to extract any information of interest for their current or future work. “It is therefore often difficult, even if a resource has actually been ‘used’ — digitally — to identify or quantify its exact contribution to the final result,” she said, making it easier for researchers and corporations to exploit a country’s biodiversity without credit.
Indigenous groups looking for recognition
At earlier talks in Geneva in March, delegates stressed that Indigenous peoples and local communities should be the primary beneficiaries, due to their crucial role in conservation and sustainability. Even though several credible studies have shown that problems like deforestation in areas managed by Indigenous communities tends to be significantly lower, the protections provided by the Nagoya Protocol haven’t been enforced in a significant way over the last eight years.
Rivasi, whose work has focused on the rights of Indigenous and local communicates, highlighted the case of French Guiana, where French researchers, based on interviews with Indigenous groups in 2005, identified — and patented — a component in Quassia amara, a traditional medicinal plant with anti-malarial properties. Though the IRD research group eventually agreed to share any potential scientific and economic benefits, it still retains the patent granted by the European Patent Agency in 2015, despite an appeal.
“This patent is a flagrant case of biopiracy. At no time were the six Indigenous communities of French Guiana consulted,” said Rivasi. “This decision jeopardizes the use of traditional remedies, as the IRD can prohibit the use of these remedies by the communities that discovered them.” In a July 2021 resolution, which Rivasi helped negotiate, the European Parliament called for consistency between the various international agreements on the subject of genetic resources. They stressed the importance of disclosing their origins in patent applications, to ensure the “fair and equitable sharing of the benefits.”
Why do people resort to biopiracy?
Biopiracy is the miss-appropriation and commercialization of genetic resources, traditional knowledge of the indigenous communities. Biopirates making to profit from freely available natural products such as plants, seeds, leaves etc. by copying techniques used daily for generations by local peoples in order to feed or take care of themselves. Biopirates are mainly pharmaceutical, cosmetic and agri-food firms. They draw on biodiversity hotspots in order to create supposedly ‘innovative ‘products and guarantee their monopoly on them through the patent system. These products are often to a large extent inspired by techniques and knowledge that have already been known and collectively managed by local communities, sometimes for thousands of years.
By copying traditional methods, these firms make considerable savings in their Research and Development activities, as well as ensuring themselves considerable income through an exclusive commercial use of the methods (Peter 2009). The Patenting of biological materials and life forms denies the concept of common goods, which has been the norm governing the natural resources management for the centuries (Graham 2000). It has commodified free goods that belong to the public, into individual properties. The concept of Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs) is a western idea to exploit. Biopiracy damages the community knowledge, traditional knowledge and national heritage of developing countries, and also a potential threat to the economic interest of many Asian and other developing countries.
The biopiracy has also caused the problem of the intrusion to national sovereignty when an individual, corporation or a government from other countries utilize and benefit from the patenting of genetic resource which derive from native species and indigenous knowledge of another sovereign state. As whole biopiracy violate the concept of common heritage of mankind, and violates the state’s sovereign rights to its own resources.
Biopiracy in an Indian Context
India is one of the countries with most diverse biological resources in the world, because of this reason; it attracts foreign companies to explore these enriched resources. India facing the issue of biopiracy is very seriously in last two decades. India’s biological materials have been exported and patented elsewhere. The reaction of the people in India to the threat of biopiracy is strong since it could severely affect the livelihood of most of the people who are living in the rural area and depending very much on agriculture and indigenous knowledge. Biopiracy Cases Traditional knowledge has always been an easily accessible treasure and thus has been susceptible to misappropriation, particularly; it related to the treatment of various diseases has provided leads for development of biologically active molecules by the technology rich countries.
Bio-piracy of codified Indian traditional knowledge continues, since, this information exists in regional languages, and there exists a language barrier due to which the patent offices are unable to search this information as prior art, before granting patents. Formulations used for the treatment of human ailments from traditional knowledge are timetested since they have been in practice for centuries. The reliability of the traditional medicine systems coupled with the absence of such information with patent offices, provides an easy opportunity for interlopers for getting patents on these therapeutic formulations derived from traditional medicines.]
This article was written by Amlan
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