Bridges Trade BioRes • Volume 5 • Number 2 • 4th February 2005

Megadiverse Countries Call for Legally Binding ABS Regime

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From 17-21 January, seventeen of the world’s most biodiverse countries met in New Delhi to develop a common position on how to ensure fair and equitable access to genetic resources and associated traditional knowledge (see Bridges Trade BioRes, 11 December 2002). The five-day meeting of the so-called Group of Like-minded Megadiverse Countries (LMMC) resulted in the “New Delhi Ministerial Declaration”, calling for a legally binding regime that regulates access to genetic resources, fair benefit-sharing and the protection of rights of communities holding traditional knowledge related to the use of genetic resources. Among the key elements, the regime is to include requirements for ensuring that access to genetic resources is based on prior informed consent and on mutually agreed terms; and for mandatory disclosure of origin of biological material and associated traditional knowledge in intellectual property applications. The LMMCs will use the Declaration as their common position for the negotiations on an international access and benefit-sharing regime at the upcoming meeting of the Ad-hoc Open-ended Working Group on Access and Benefit Sharing, to be held in Bangkok, Thailand on 14-18 February. Several of the LMMCs, — albeit not as the same group — have submitted similar proposals at the WTO Council for Trade -related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS; see Bridges Trade BioRes, 3 December 2004).

The LMMCs include: Bolivia, Brazil, China, Colombia, Costa Rica, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ecuador, India, Indonesia, Kenya, Madagascar, Malaysia, Mexico, Peru, the Philippines, South Africa and Venezuela.

“’Group of 17 countries’ to resist exploitation of bio resources,” DECCAN HERALD, 21 January 2005; “Developing nations want treaty on use of biodiversity,” TV PADMA, 24 January 2005.