<<A href="http://us.f411.mail.yahoo.com/ym/Compose?To=AgBioIndia@agbioindia.org&YY=65714&order=down&sort=date&pos=0&view=a&head=b">AgBioIndia@agbioindia.org</A>> schrieb am 05.12.02 05:48:03:<BR>====================<BR>AgBioIndia Mailing List<BR>====================<BR>05 December 2002<BR><BR>Subject: Biopiracy and India's Biodiversity Bill<BR><BR>At a time when biopiracy and (mis)appropriation of genetic resources <BR>and the traditional knowledge associated with its use has assumed <BR>alarming proportion, Lok Sabha, the Lower House in Indian Parliament <BR>has <BR>passed the controversial National Biodiversity Bill. The Bill will now <BR>be <BR>placed in the Upper House, Rajya Sabha, which had earlier turned it <BR>down. <BR>The re-introduction of the Bill comes with 69 amendments!<BR><BR>The National Biodiversity Bill, which will become an Act if the Rajya <BR>Sabha accords approval, is surely a step in the right direction. The <BR>Bill is ac
tually the culmination of a process that was initiated by two <BR>NGOs -- Forum for Biotechnology & Food Security, and Gene Campaign -- <BR>when they had put out a draft act for conserving and protecting the <BR>country's massive biodiversity. This was some four to five years ago. <BR>The <BR>NGOs intitiative had shaken up the government from slumber and forced <BR>to <BR>put together an official Bill. But not everyone is happy. And rightly <BR>so.<BR><BR>The National Biodiversity Bill is a weak instrument when it comes to <BR>protecting the traditional knowledge. In fact, it provides no legal <BR>protection to the traditional knowledge that this country has. By <BR>documenting and putting the information in a digital form (justifying <BR>it by <BR>saying that this will protect its misappropriation), the Ministry for <BR>Environment & Forests is actually facilitating the process of <BR>biopiracy.<BR><BR>Further, the Bill is silent on the newest form of biopiracy - ge
nome <BR>sequencing. With multinational companies mapping the genomes of plants <BR>and animals, and then cloning the genes and drawing IPR over these, how <BR>can the country's interests be protected?<BR><BR>Contents:<BR><BR>1. Parliament Clears Biodiversity Bill<BR>2. Biodiversity policy: bold, new step -- By Keya Acharya<BR>-------------------------------<BR><BR>1. Parliament clears Bio-Diversity Bill<BR>Pioneer News Service<BR><BR>New Delhi, Dec 3: Keen to preserve the biological resources of the <BR>country, Parliament on Monday gave its approval for setting up of a <BR>three-tier structure including an apex National Biodiversity Authority <BR>(NBA) <BR>at Chennai. The Biological Diversity Bill, passed by a voice vote in <BR>Lok <BR>Sabha, seeks establishment of State bio-diversity boards (SBBs) and <BR>bio-diversity management committees (BMCs), besides the NBA, to <BR>regulate <BR>access to the diverse plant and animal genetic resources in the <BR>country.<BR><B
R>Winding up a debate on the bill, Environment and Forests Minister T R <BR>Baalu on Monday allayed fears that the measure could lead to <BR>exploitation and piracy of traditional knowledge and said the <BR>Government would <BR>provide adequate safeguards against any misuse of the law by <BR>multinational <BR>companies and others. Steps would be taken to enhance capacity at <BR>village level through the BMCs to ensure true empowerment of the people <BR>and <BR>provisions of the bill primarily addressed issues concerning access to <BR>genetic resources and associated knowledge by foreign individuals, <BR>institutions or companies, he said. It also envisaged equitable sharing <BR>of <BR>benefits from these resources and knowledge with the country concerned.<BR><BR>Defending the decision to have the NBA at Chennai, Mr.Baalu said the <BR>city has rich biodiversity as it is surrounded by Bay of Bengal, <BR>Arabian <BR>Sea, Indian Ocean, Western Ghat, Eastern Ghat and wide range o
f flora <BR>and fauna. Participating in the discussion, members expressed <BR>apprehensions that the bill may enable multinational companies and <BR>foreign <BR>agencies to grab many valuable knowledge and skills. Besides protecting <BR>knowledge of local communities related to bio-diversity, the bill seeks <BR>to <BR>conserve and develop areas important from the standpoint of biological <BR>diversity by declaring them as heritage sites. In the past, the <BR>biological resources of the country had been shared freely with other <BR>countries <BR>but this scenario had changed following the coming into force of the <BR>convention on biological diversity. The convention provides for <BR>facilitating access to genetic resources for environmentally sound uses <BR>on <BR>mutually agreed terms with prior consent of the country providing these <BR>resources.<BR><BR>The minister said such facilitation of access could be provided only <BR>through national legislation. Congress deputy l
eader Shivraj V. Patil, <BR>however, said the bill had been drafted in a casual and clumsy manner <BR>and <BR>was devoid of lucidity.<BR>--------------------<BR><BR>2. Biodiversity policy: bold, new step<BR>By Keya Acharya<BR><BR>Deccan Herald, Nov 29<BR><BR>India's largest and most complex effort at documenting its natural <BR>biodiversity and coming up with implementable strategies to conserve <BR>it, is <BR>currently nearing completion. The UNDP-Global Environmental Facility <BR>and the Union Environment Ministry's National Biodiversity Strategy and <BR>Action Plan (NBSAP) has been a two-year process involving participation <BR>of all States and Union Territories. Executed in an unusually <BR>innovative Government collaboration with an NGO, NBSAP's scope has been <BR>huge: 18 <BR>sub-State ecological zones, 10 inter-State ecologically important <BR>zones, 13 thematic level plans on major areas of biodiversity and 30 <BR>reviews <BR>of specialised biodiversity areas.<BR><B
R>The outreach has been equally wide. Tens of thousands of people <BR>including school children and youth, along with Government <BR>administration, <BR>have been garnered through 'biodiversity melas', cycle and bullock-cart <BR>rallies, cultural programmes, calls for public hearings and <BR>participation <BR>to put forward their suggestions and concern.<BR><BR>Studies of India's floral and faunal history through geological <BR>evolution of ghats, mountains and rivers together with its history of <BR>human <BR>ethnicity have formed the basis for profiling India's biodiversity. <BR>Economic, cultural, scientific, aesthetic, food security and health <BR>values <BR>have been studied, along with current laws and policies to check the <BR>causes for the loss of biodiversity.<BR><BR>It has one significant deviation though, in its attempts at critically <BR>analysing its own processes. Thus it states that though most critical <BR>areas have been covered, NBSAP's integration of gend
er equity and <BR>empowerment has remained weak. Its link with Government departments of <BR>Agriculture, Health and Biotechnology has also remained nebulous. One <BR>positive outcome of that inability to co-ordinate is that it has <BR>highlighted <BR>India's inadequate baseline data on genetic diversity, whether wild or <BR>domesticated, and the consequent poor understanding of the links <BR>between <BR>wild and agricultural biodiversity. State Governments have been more <BR>open to the exercise and made moves towards formulating plans for <BR>biodiversity conservation.<BR><BR>Rousing response<BR><BR>Ironically enough, even while ecological degradation is rampant <BR>throughout the country, the response from the people of India towards <BR>the <BR>process has been overwhelming. In Andhra Pradesh's tribal belt of <BR>Srikakulam, youth self-help groups, village panchayats and women's <BR>sanghas have <BR>taken it on themselves to collaborate with the Government to rope in <BR
>schemes existing within the Integrated Rural Development Project.<BR><BR>In Punjab, the nodal agency appointed for conducting the NBSAP did an <BR>analysis of the entire available biodiversity-related PhD and MPhil <BR>theses from the State's academic institutions. The Rajasthan State <BR>nodal <BR>agency developed an integrated chart on the impact of biodiversity on <BR>the <BR>various Government departments. Mizoram, Meghalaya and Tripura <BR>conducted village-level public hearings across several districts, <BR>generating <BR>interest and awareness. In Karnataka, an entire cadre of college <BR>students <BR>conducted mapping and data collection exercises in documenting the <BR>State's biodiversity and traditional plant knowledge into Biodiversity <BR>Registers.<BR><BR>Article 6 of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD, 1993) of <BR>which India is a signatory along with 174 others, requires parties to <BR>prepare NBSAPs. The UNDP-GEF combine has sponsored these biodiv
ersity <BR>strategies and action plans in countries in Asia, South America, Africa <BR>and <BR>nation-islands. Interestingly, the tiny and strife-ravaged Palestine <BR>has <BR>already begun implementing its conservation recommendations.<BR><BR>Biodiversity Bill<BR><BR>What is the Indian Government going to do with these plans? Its vision <BR>of becoming a 'developed' nation by 2025 and the administrative bend <BR>towards all-out development have led to rapid ecological decline as <BR>well <BR>as conflict with the community at large. Lakes are drying up, seas are <BR>over-fished and dumped with toxics, mountains and lands defaced in a <BR>manner that shows serious absence of a sound land-use policy. The EIAs <BR>(environmental integrated assessment), required by law in commercial <BR>projects involving natural resources have more often than not thrown up <BR>inadequate evaluation and highlighted the absence of a compulsory <BR>independent assessment. The Government has not pr
ioritised <BR>environmental <BR>conservation in its bid to develop the country.<BR><BR>Yet it is not that biodiversity conservation is new to India. Numerous <BR>Central Government conservation initiatives are being conducted mainly <BR>by the ministries of science, technology, environment and agriculture. <BR>The Biodiversity Conservation Prioritisation Project (BCPP 1999) was <BR>India's largest and most comprehensive exercise to prioritise sites, <BR>species and strategies for conservation.<BR><BR>NBSAP is now leaning on the Biodiversity Bill, asking that each State's <BR>Biodiversity Board works in tandem with a Central NBSAP Implementation <BR>Committee formed through cross-country representation of NGOs, civil <BR>society and Government and seeks recognition of biodiversity within the <BR>Planning Commission.<BR><BR>But in spite of its best efforts, the country's poor record of <BR>implementing environmental laws leaves the NBSAP vulnerably exposed to <BR>each <BR>Stat
e's interest in the matter. And each State's interest in turn <BR>stands <BR>vulnerably exposed to 'development'. Perhaps the best counter to this <BR>would be in the active voice of all the tens of thousands of people <BR>that <BR>helped formulate the strategy. Let us at least hold our heads up on <BR>this one and pull off implementation this time round.<BR><BR>____________________________________________<BR> <BR>The AgBioIndia mailing list is an effort by the Forum for Biotechnology <BR>& Food Security to bridge the yawning gap in our understanding of the <BR>politics of food. We believe this mailing list will create wider <BR>awareness and understanding of the compexities of the crisis facing <BR>Indian <BR>agriculture and food security. This list will keep you posted on the <BR>intricacies and games being enacted in the name of eradicating hunger.<BR><BR>It is a non-commercial educational service for non-profit organisations <BR>and individuals. Subscribers are welco
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