Managing Global Genetic Resources Agricultural Crop Issues and Policies (1993) / Chapter Skim
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14. Conflicts Over Ownership, Management, and Use
14. Conflicts Over Ownership, Management, and Use
Pages 321-346
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From page 321... ...
POLITICS AND GEOGRAPHY The conservation, management, and use of crop germplasm have become highly politicized in recent years. The difficulties of conserving food crop germplasm and the political controversies over the distribution and use of genetic resources ultimately have their origin in the vagaries of biology.
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From page 322... ...
The International Board for Plant Genetic Resources In the early 1970s, the Technical Advisory Committee of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) established a means of coordinating and supporting the conservation of genetic resources.
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From page 323... ...
In some instances, it was argued that finished varieties, consisting primarily of germplasm that originated in developing countries, were being imported by developing countries at high prices (Mooney, 1979, 1983~. The assertion was made that the developing world (the South)
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From page 324... ...
The development of biotechnology raised the perceived value of crop genetic resources and reinforced the perception that developing countries could be increasingly exploited (Fowler and Mooney, 1990; Goldstein, 1988~. INTERNATIONAL DIALOGUE ON PLANT GENETIC RESOURCES During the twenty-first Biennial Conference of FAO in 1981, Resolution 681 was proposed, which requested the director general to draft an international convention "including legal provisions designed to ensure that global plant genetic resources of agricultural interest will be conserved and used for the benefit of all human beings, in this and future generations, without restrictive practices that limit their availability or exchange, whatever the source of such practices" (Food and Agriculture Organization, 1981~.
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From page 325... ...
This position was advanced by developing country FAO ambassadors, because including advanced breeding materials in the resolution would reinforce the free flow of genetic materials, make a wider range of germplasm available to plant breeders in the developing world, and reduce developing country expenditures on imported seed. Developed countries, notably those with private seed industries and plant breeders' rights legislation, argued that only wild relatives, landraces, and varieties not covered by patent or patentlike protection should be included.
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From page 326... ...
. Because finished varieties and elite breeding lines are in part derived from germplasm of developing country origin that was obtained without a fee, they should be freely available to developing country researchers.
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From page 327... ...
The advanced industrial nations wish to retain free access to the developing world's storehouse of genetic diversity, while the developing nations would like to have the proprietary varieties of advanced nations' seed industry declared a similarly public good. It can be argued that neither side in the debate has a fully defensible or realistic position.
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From page 328... ...
328 / Agricultural Crop Issues and Policies TABLE 14-1 Countries That Joined the Commission on Plant Genetic Resources of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) or Agreed to Support the International Undertaking on Plant Genetic Resources Regions and Member of Supports Country FAG Commission Undertaking Africa Angola Benin Botswana Burkina Faso Cameroon Cape Verde Central African Republic Chad Congo C6te D'Ivoire Equatorial Guinea Ethiopia Gabon Gambia Ghana Guinea Guinea-Bissau Kenya Liberia Madagascar Malawi Mali Mauritania Mauritius Morocco Mozambique Niger Rwanda Senegal Sierra Leone South Africa Sudan Tanzania 1OgO Uganda ~ ~alre Zambia Zimbabwe .
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From page 329... ...
Conflicts Over Ownership, Management, and Use / 329 TABLE 14-1 Continued Regions and Country Member of Supports FAG Commission Undertaking Asia and the Southwest Pacific Australia Bangladesh .
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From page 330... ...
330 / Agricultural Crop Issues and Policies TABLE 14-1 Continued Regions and Country Member of Supports FAO Commission Undertaking Europe continued Romania Russia Spain Sweden Switzerland United Kingdom Yugoslaviaa Latin America and the Caribbean Antigua and Barbuda Argentina Barbados Belize Bolivia Brazil Chile Colombia Costa Rica Cuba Dominica Dominican Republic Ecuador E1 Salvador Grenada Guatemala Guyana Haiti Honduras Jamaica Mexico Nicaragua Panama Paraguay Peru Saint Christopher and Nevis Saint Lucia Saint Vincent and the Grenadines surname Trinidad and Tobago Uruguay Venezuela
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From page 331... ...
SOURCE: Unpublished information from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. Nonetheless, although the rhetorical debate is rooted in fundamental differences of interest and opinion, there is room for common ground on the genetic resources question.
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From page 332... ...
This understanding was further strengthened during the 1989 meeting of the FAO Cornmission on Plant Genetic Resources (Food and Agriculture Organization, 1989b; Keystone Center, 1990~. Some of this moderation resulted from the first of a series of dialogues organized by the Keystone Center, which brought together a mix of social activists, public and private plant breeders, conservationists, curators of germplasm banks, and government officials with the goal of finding areas of consensus and compromise in the debate (Keystone Center, 1988~.
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From page 333... ...
. The commission also discussed the need to establish an international fund to ensure adequate financial resources for genetic conservation (Food and Agriculture Organization, 1987b,f)
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From page 334... ...
Over the past few decades, plant breeding and seed production in Europe and North America have been dominated by private industry. Early in this century, small nurseries and seed merchants started selecting their own varieties, often for limited regional markets, using regionally available landraces and imported materials as their base material.
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From page 335... ...
This has led to a nonproprietary system of plant breeding on an international scale, with largely free exchange of finished varieties, advanced breeding lines, and unimproved materials such as landraces and wild species. Local multiplication of varieties and distribution of seeds by farmers are encouraged.
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From page 336... ...
Typically, the major disadvantage of public-dominated plant breeding systems in the developing world is in the area of seed production and distribution, particularly their tendency toward a lack of efficiency and effectiveness compared with that of private industry. However, intermediary forms of public and private institutional arrangements may well be possible in this sphere.
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From page 337... ...
The issues will become more complex as questions of plant genetic material and plant breeders' rights give way to questions involving all forms of genetic material and the proprietary rights associated with biotechnology. They will also become more difficult as the developed countries become less willing to support public sector agricultural research both at home and in the developing countries and as such research becomes more and more centered in the private sector (de Janvry and Dethier, 1985; Ruttan, 1982~.
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From page 338... ...
· Ideally, global rules governing plant genetic resources should have the effect of encouraging conservation and utilization activities in the future, rather than relying largely or entirely on realizing rents from previous activities and investments. The royalty rights of intellectual property are normally justified because they provide forwardlooking incentives to encourage invention and innovation, although it should be recognized that, in practice, proprietary rights in plant genetic materials may serve to protect marketing investments and augment the value of previous breeding investments.
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From page 339... ...
The third is to focus attention on strengthening plant breeding and building biotechnology research capacity in the developing world rather than on legal arrangements. This would restore reciprocity between the industries of the developed and developing countries and would remove some of the difficulties that now make the problem so intractable.
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From page 340... ...
At one extreme, there may have been net benefits to the developing world because plant breeders' rights in the developed world may have led to breeding innovations that have been shared with the developing world. At the other extreme, there may have been a net cost to the developing world.
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From page 341... ...
Assuming that this indirect effect is perhaps one-tenth of the direct effect, or an effect of about 1 percent on sales, and that total annual seed sales in the developing world are about US$10 billion, the greatest plausible annual cost of plant breeders' rights to developing nations (remembering that there may actually be net benefit rather than a cost) would be about US$100 million.
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From page 342... ...
Comparable problems with copyright payments for musical recordings played on the radio are sometimes handled by creating a fund and dividing the proceeds according to formulas that reasonably approximate what the complicated and expensive negotiations might produce. Note, also, that existing public sector germplasm banks may be placed in a very awkward position with respect to accepting material under the agreements likely to be imposed by developing nations just as they would be by accepting patented materials (including genes)
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From page 343... ...
To the extent that the concerns of developing countries about genetic resources are a reflection of their concerns about the status of their plant breeding and biotechnology sectors, it may be better to work directly to improve the positions of developing countries in these sectors by providing them with the means of using their own resources more effectively. An immediate answer is that the developing world does not have a chance against the large multinational corporations, but there are reasons to believe that this is not the case.
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From page 344... ...
It expends resources on the development of a global scientific and technological community rather than on new bodies of law. It takes advantage of the opportunities available from biotechnology, avoids complicated intellectual property negotiations, and builds on the rapid evolution of the seed industries of develop.
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From page 345... ...
If left unresolved these issues will seriously hamper international cooperation and the unrestricted, free flow of genetic resources between countries. As necessary as political will and cooperative relations among scientists are to germplasm exchange, the funding levels and technical standards of genetic resources collection and preservation activities are major influences on distribution.
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From page 346... ...
The capacities for plant breeding and biotechnology in developingcountries should be strengthened. The governments of developing nations could help their plant breeding and biotechnology sectors by establishing appropriate economic incentives and institutions.
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