Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
21
Biodiversity, intellectual property rights regime
and indigenous knowledge system at the WTO:
revisiting the unresolved issues
Sachin Chaturvedi
Introduction
In the last decade, interlinkages between the intellectual property rights (IPR) regime, bio-
diversity and the indigenous knowledge system (IKS) have emerged as one of the most
contentious issues in the current round of World Trade Organization (WTO) negotia-
tions. In fact the discontent among developing countries with the legacy of Uruguay
Round in the realm of IPR has been so intense that debate on these interlinkages has over-
shadowed the Doha Round and has emerged as a major component of the negotiating
agenda from the South, behind which all could rally.
The debate on these issues takes place at several multilateral fora, including at the World
Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), which established an Inter-governmental
Committee (IGC) on Intellectual Property and Genetic Resources, Traditional Knowledge
and Folklore,
1
apart from at the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food
and Agriculture (ITPGRFA), under the aegis of FAO which further encouraged protec-
tion and promotion of farmers' rights and indigenous knowledge system (IKS). Currently,
this WIPO IGC is also discussing draft provisions for the enhanced protection of tradi-
tional knowledge and traditional cultural expressions against misappropriation and
misuse.
However, it is at the Council for Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights
(TRIPs) that the intensity of debate is very high. Since the Doha Ministerial, the deliber-
ations on TRIPs have hovered around three major issues of concern to various members:
the review of the provisions of Article 27.3 (b); the relationship between the TRIPs agree-
ment and the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD); and the protection of tradi-
tional knowledge and folklore. The recent Norwegian proposal
2
for amending the
Agreement on TRIPs to make it mandatory for patent applicants to disclose any biolog-
ical resources or associated traditional knowledge used in the inventions has given a new
push to the demands from the developing countries for an equitable distribution of the
gains appropriated through IKS and biodiversity.
With the advent of biotechnology, the economics related to biological resources and
related IKS has triggered a major global debate on prior informed consent (PIC) and
access and bene
t sharing (ABS).
3
It is estimated that the global market for the pharma-
ceutical sector using genetic resources stands at US$300 billion per year.
4
The advances
in biotechnology have facilitated faster identi
fi
cation of compounds as time taken for
screening several plant samples for ranges of tests and their molecular characterization
for further development of drugs has been curtailed to a great extent. In the context of
WTO negotiations, access to biodiversity and sharing bene
fi
fi
ts derived from it is pro-
posed to be addressed di
ff
erently. Several countries have proposed a national access and
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