Patents and Access and Benefit-Sharing Contracts: Conservation or Just More Red Tape?

Countries are increasingly using access and benefit sharing (ABS) as a legal mechanism to support the conservation and sustainable use of the world’s biological diversity. ABS regulates collection and/or use of genetic resources/traditional knowledge and sharing benefits from their use with the provider. The purpose of this review is to assess the trends, biases and gaps of ABS literature using a regional comparative approach about the key topics of concern between each region. It analyses four key topic groupings: (1) implementation of international, regional and national ABS policy and law; (2) intellectual property and ABS; (3) traditional knowledge; and (4) research, development and commercialisation. Findings included gaps in: (1) analysing effectiveness of national level implementation; (2) addressing apparent conflicts between support for intellectual property promoting exclusivity for traditional knowledge and challenges to intellectual property exclusivity for patents; (3) examining traditional knowledge of local communities (in contrast to Indigenous Peoples); and (4) lack of practical examples that quantify benefit sharing from research and commercialisation outcomes. We conclude that future research addressing the identified gaps and biases can promote more informed understanding among stakeholders about the ABS concept and whether it is capable of delivering concrete biological conservation, sustainable use and equity outcomes.

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Protecting Traditional Knowledge Holders' Interests and Preventing Misappropriation—Traditional Knowledge Commons and Biocultural Protocols: Necessary but Not Sufficient?

International Journal of Cultural Property ◽

10.1017/s0940739112000252 ◽

2012 ◽

Vol 19 (3) ◽

pp. 401-422 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Krishna Ravi Srinivas

Keyword(s):

Informed Consent ◽

Traditional Knowledge ◽

Biological Diversity ◽

Indigenous Communities ◽

Benefit Sharing ◽

Convention On Biological Diversity ◽

Access And Benefit Sharing ◽

Nagoya Protocol ◽

Prior Informed Consent ◽

Knowledge Commons

AbstractThe experience of the indigenous communities regarding access and benefit sharing under the national regimes based on provisions of Convention on Biological Diversity and Bonn Guidelines has not been satisfactory. The communities expect that noncommercial values should be respected and misappropriation should be prevented. Some academics and civil society groups have suggested that traditional knowledge commons and biocultural protocols will be useful in ensuring that while noncommercial values are respected, access and benefit sharing takes place on conditions that are acceptable to the communities. This proposal is examined in this context in the larger context of access and benefit sharing under the Convention on Biological Diversity and implementing prior informed consent principles in access and benefit sharing. This article examines knowledge commons, provides examples from constructed commons in different sectors and situates traditional knowledge commons in the context of debates on commons and public domain. The major shortcomings of traditional commons and bicultural protocol are pointed out, and it is suggested that these are significant initiatives that can be combined with the Nagoya Protocol to fulfill the expectations of indigenous communities.

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