Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
Table 4.4
Good Practice, Criticisms and Challenges of Niprisan/Nicosan Case
Good Practice
Criticisms
Challenges
Treatment developed by
African scientists based
on African traditional
knowledge for neglected
disease
Benefit-sharing negotiations
excluded traditional knowl-
edge holder
To date, no royalty
sharing with traditional
knowledge holder
as agreed in MOU shows
the challenge of
enforcement
Comprehensive MOU devel-
oped and later adopted by
WIPO and WHO
Post-study obligations to clinical
trial participants according to
Declaration of Helsinki not
honoured
Bankruptcy of licensee
Strengthening of pharmaceuti-
cal research and manufac-
turing capacity in Nigeria
Drug price outside reach
of poor patients
Lack of capacity of
local companies to
produce drug despite
considerable local
investment
Should wider
community where
traditional knowledge
holder lived share in the
benefits?
General CBD challenge
that commodification is
allegedly not compatible
with sacredness of
traditional knowledge
In the Niprisan/Nicosan case, the pre-CBD legal emphasis was on the protec-
tion of traditional knowledge
as distinct from
environmental concerns and the
sustainable use of biodiversity. The potential impacts of the research into and
production of Niprisan/Nicosan were not addressed in the MOU. The advent of
the CBD in 1992 - with its three core objectives of the conservation of biological
diversity, the sustainable use of its components, and the fair and equitable shar-
ing of the benefits - represented a codification of increasing global concerns about
the interlinked nature of the issues at stake, and had a major impact, intentionally,
on research agendas. One of the most interesting and controversial benefit-sharing
stories from this transitional period comes from Mexico.
4.5 The Chiapas Case (Mexico)
17
In late 1998, a five-year research project funded by the International Cooperative
Biodiversity Group (ICBG) programme, a consortium of US federal agencies, began
in the central highlands of Chiapas, Mexico, one of the richest and most endan-
gered biodiversity regions on earth. In the wake of the CBD, 'Drug Discovery and
17
This case study draws upon Feinholz-Klip, Barrios and Cook Lucas (
2009
).
