The emerging global regime on genetic resources: its implications for local communities

This briefing paper gives an overview of the emerging global regime on genetic resources, with a special emphasis on its implications for local and impoverished communities worldwide. It identifies the key issues, stakeholders, processes and opportunities and outlines a strategy for intervention.

The author identifies two levels of tension existing in the debate over access to genetic resources:

• between providers of genetic material in the global south and those countries of the North who have the requisite scientific and technological expertise to utilise genetic material
• between companies and research institutions, mostly from the North, who want to have access to genetic resources and local and impoverished communities of the South who would like to get meaningful benefits from these resources.

The report identifies the relevant processes as being:

• the processes under the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) on access and benefit sharing of genetic resources and on the implementation of Article 8j (which focuses on the innovations and practices of indigenous and local communities);
• the recently adopted International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture;
• the Doha work programme on the clarification of the relationship between the CBD and TRIPS as it relates to traditional knowledge.

And lists the issues as:

• Issues related to prior informed consent , including the role of stakeholders
• Designing and implementing appropriate and effective benefit sharing arrangements, including benefits for local communities;
• Questions related to intellectual property rights and its implications to holders of local and traditional knowledge.

The author argues that unlike the other stakeholders, the voices of local communities, with the possible exception of indigenous peoples, are not being effectively heard in these ongoing global decision processes. If global ABS decisions are made that would facilitate access to genetic resources without the participation of such communities, the emerging genetic resources regime could aggravate existing threats to their resource tenure and control of biological and genetic resources and their traditional knowledge. However these processes offer a unique opportunity for such communities to maximise the compensation they could receive under benefit sharing arrangements that are designed and implemented properly. A strategy for intervention in the global processes relevant to the emerging global regime on genetic resources could therefore have the following goals:

• the adoption of global norms on transparency and public participation in decision making
• the acceptance of the principle of free and prior informed consent by local communities before states allow access to genetic resources
• the establishment of benefit sharing mechanisms that provide immediate, long term benefits to developing countries and communities
• the creation of an international certification system that could trace genetic flows and the circumstances under which material were obtained and utilised.

Additional requirements for the process identified include:

• Local capacity building
• The building of alliances amongst local communities and with sympathetic constituencies, including with scientists, environmental organisations, other civil society organisations and stakeholder groups.