January 26, 2005
Indigenous
communities' rights to potato strains recognised
A groundbreaking agreement in Peru has recognised the rights of
indigenous communities over potato strains that they had
developed. The pact signed by six Peruvian indigenous
communities with the
International Potato Center (IPC), a Lima-based agricultural
research centre and gene bank, would prevent companies from
patenting the potato strains as well as the related traditional
knowledge.
Under the agreement -- the first of its kind -- the gene bank
returns the genetic resources and knowledge associated with the
potato strains to the six communities, which have established a
'potato park' in a conservation area to grow and manage the
plants. It also specifies that they should not become "subject
to intellectual property rights in any form". Alejandro Argumedo
from the Association for Nature and Sustainable Development
(ANDES), which helped broker the deal, described it as "a first
legal sign of the restoration of rights that indigenous people
once had." He stressed that the communities were not interested
in patenting the potato strains, since patents "represent a
model of property that does not fit into their worldview" which
is based on the open exchange and sharing of information.
The London-based International Institute for Environment and
Development (IIED) hailed the agreement for allowing the
indigenous communities to "unlock the potato gene bank and
repatriate biological diversity to farming communities and the
natural environment for local and global benefit," and suggested
that it might inform similar processes elsewhere.
The text of the agreement is available at
http://www.grain.org/bio-ipr/?id=429
"Potato Capital of the world offers up new recipe," IPS, 18
January 2005; " New Potato Deal in Peru Signposts Global Drive
to Open Up Food Genebanks to Indigenous Peoples," INTERNATIONAL
INSTITUTE FOR ENVIRONMENT AND DEVELOPMENT, 18 January 2005; "
Indians in Peru regain potato rights," NEW SCIENTIST, 22 January
2005.
Source:
BRIDGES Weekly
Trade News Digest - Vol. 9, Number 2 26 January 2005
Lima, Peru
January 19, 2005
by Priya Shetty,
SciDev.Net
Farming
communities in Peru have signed an agreement with the
International Potato Centre (CIP) to protect both the genetic
diversity of the region's numerous potato varieties, and the
rights of indigenous people to control access to these local
genetic resources.
Under the scheme, CIP scientists
and local farmers will 'repatriate' potato varieties from CIP's
collection of specimens — the world's most comprehensive — and
conserve them in a 'potato park'. As well as providing food for
the six communities that jointly own the land in southern Peru,
the 15,000-hectare park will serve as a 'living library' of
potato genetic diversity.
Peruvian farmers have 'lost'
some of their traditional potato varieties for various reasons,
including government policies to push ahead with commercial
production and discard old-fashioned growing methods.
The agreement, which is the
first of its kind, aims to ensure that the control of genetic
resources is kept with local people. Alejandro Argumedo,
associate director of the Association for Nature and Sustainable
Development — a Cusco-based civil society group that helped
broker the deal — believes that it could serve as a model for
other indigenous communities.
"Biological diversity is best
rooted in its natural environment and managed by indigenous
peoples who know it best," says Argumedo.
Despite this, he says that the
agreement was not drawn up for local communities to secure
intellectual property rights over indigenous potato strains.
Rather, the intention is to ensure that the genetic material
does not become "subject to intellectual property rights in any
form" and that the diversity of Peruvian potato varieties is
maintained.
Argumedo told SciDev.Net that
CIP has agreed to pay for the cost of reintroducing the strains
as an acknowledgment of the benefits the organisation has
derived from the indigenous knowledge of the region.
However, he maintains that this
agreement would not hamper collaborative research between the
CIP and scientists elsewhere — provided that the research is not
used for exploitative or commercial purposes.
CIP is one of the 15 research
centres of Consultative Group for International Agricultural
Research (CGIAR), which aims to reduce poverty and increase food
security in developing countries through scientific research.
Rachel Wynberg of Biowatch South
Africa, an organisation that monitors the commercialisation of
biological resources, hopes that "this agreement signals a new
way of working for CGIAR centres — one which advances the rights
of local farming communities, over those of corporations, and
which places the ownership of genetic resources firmly with the
local custodians of these resources".
At a meeting in Mexico in
November 2004, environmental activists protested that CGIAR was
building too many links with large biotechnology corporations
that promote genetically modified crops (see
Agriculture group panders to GM
giants, say activists).
Alejandro
Argumedo is on the advisory panel of SciDev.Net's
indigenous knowledge dossier
For more on
this subject, visit SciDev.Net's dossiers on
intellectual property
and
indigenous knowledge |