We are grateful to the indigenous people of Amazonia for sharing with the world their marvelous ethnobotanical knowledge accrued over millennia. People all over the world already realize many current medicinal and health benefits from this knowledge, and much more awaits "discovery" by the western world.  We recognize that this knowledge is their exclusive intellectual property and condemn those who would appropriate it for personal profit with fair acknowledgement and just compensation.

We believe that partnerships established with the informed consent and agreement of legitimate representatives of indigenous communities, may be acceptable if:

a. traditional indigenous use and access to these plants is not compromised in any way

b. the biological survival of any plant species is not threatened by commercial harvest

c. a competent professional biological assessment is done to determine range and distribution, critical ecology, reproductive/propagative requirements and fecundity of any plant proposed for commercial export

d. a fair profit-sharing plan is established to provide long-term income for indigenous communities from cultivation or sustained-yield harvest of medicinal plants

e. the rightful indigenous custodians of these botanical treasures and knowledge be namedas the principal patent holders if such patents are allowed

f. certain plants and their cultivars serving vital spiritual functions in indigenous cultures are forever exempt from any foreign or colonial proprietary exploitation or prohibition whatsoever.

We urge you to boycott all products produced and marketed by the individuals and/or corporations highlighted in red below and any others which seek to appropriate knowledge and/or plant cultivars for their personal profit without the informed consent and agreement of the rightful owners of this knowledge and resource.

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An Affront to
Indigenous People of the Amazon

This article is reprinted from the Cultural Survival Canada Homepage atttp://www.cscanada.org/~csc
Cultural Survival Canada (CS Canada) is an autonomous, international indigenous peoples' organization and a registered charity. Their day-to-day work consists of research, education, and advocacy on themes of traditional knowledge and the rights of indigenous peoples.  International BioPark Foundation and El Tigre Journeys supports CS Canada in their efforts to protect the traditional knowledge and rights of indigenous peoples worldwide.

There is a plant that has been grown by our people for thousands of years. It's a sacred plant and a source of vital foods and medicines. Traditions for tending and using this plant have been carefully handed down from one generation to the next. Today, in knowledgable hands it continues to nourish our people physically and spiritually. We hope that the generations yet to come will enjoy this same relationship.

One day we hear a rumour that we can no longer call this plant our own. A large pharmaceutical corporation has claimed the plant as their exclusive property and a foreign government has already agreed to recognize the "intellectual property rights" of this corporation over our sacred plant.

Now the corporation is pressuring governments throughout our region to recognize and enforce these same intellectual property rights.  If the corporation is successful, our people could lose their legal right to save and exchange seeds from our sacred plant. Instead, we will be forced to buy the seeds from the corporation. And instead of learning from our elders how to prepare and use the medicines derived from this plant, we may have no choice but to buy a factory-made version of our medicine from the corporation or do without.

Even worse, the corporation might see our traditional medicine as unwanted competition for other drugs it wants to sell and use its intellectual property rights to try to suppress the cultivation and use of our plant.

Could this really happen? Can a corporation claim ownership of plants long grown by indigenous peoples or medicines central to our cultures? And do we have reason to fear that we will be denied access to our own traditions and sources of sustenance?

The answer is an emphatic yes. In fact the colonialization of life itself, the latest and perhaps final wave of colonialism, is already well underway.

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The Theft of Ayahuasca

the names of known biopirates appear in bold red type

Ayahuasca is a traditional medicine central to the lives of indigenous peoples throughout the Amazon river basin. Almost a decade ago, Loren Miller of the International Plant Medicine Corporation applied to the US government to be recognized as the "inventor" of ayahuasca. Although ayahuasca has been produced and used by Amazonian peoples since time immemorial, the US Patent and Trademark Office agreed to grant Miller a patent, a form of intellectual property that conveys exclusive rights to produce and trade the patented item, at least within the country where the patent is granted.

Currently, the patent on ayahuasca applies only to a few western countries, including the U.S..  However, when Amazonian peoples first learned about the patent in the summer of 1996, the Ecuadorian government was considering entering into a trade agreement with the U.S. that would have led to patents granted in the US being extended to Ecuador.  Although popular organizing by indigenous peoples and environmentalists temporarily defeated that trade deal, the threat remains that some day the patent on ayahuasca may be recognized and enforced in the Amazon, leading to restrictions on indigenous peoples' use of their sacred plant.

And regardless of whether or not this threat ever turns into reality, granting a foreign corporation intellectual property rights over ayahuasca represents a direct denial of indigenous peoples' rights over their own knowledge and innovation. As stated by COICA, the coordinating body for indigenous peoples' organizations in the Amazon region, "ayahuasca is a fundamental ingredient of the religious ceremonies and of healing for our people, and this patent is a real affront to the over four hundred cultures that populate the Amazon Basin."

Here is a 1998 update on the ayahuasca patent issue.
...and in November, 1999, justice finally prevails...Ayahuasca Patent Rescinded!

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More Examples of Biopiracy

The patenting of ayahuasca is not an isolated case. In fact, it is only one example of the increasingly frequent assault on indigenous peoples' knowledge and the richness and variety of living things that we steward.

In 1994, for example, a U.S. university (unnamed in this article) patented a variety of the indigenous grain quinoa, a vital subsistence food crop grown throughout the Andes. The university also patented all other quinoa bred from this variety now and in the future.

Similarly, U.S. plant breeder Sally Fox has been awarded patent-like rights over coloured cotton derived from virtually identical varieties long grown by indigenous peoples throughout the Americas.

Shaman Pharmaceuticals has patented the plant sangre de drago (Croton lechleri) cultivated by indigenous peoples in Central and South America.

W.R. Grace has patented two uses of the neem tree already well known and widely used in traditional agriculture in Asia and East Africa.

And the U.S. government itself patented, and later released into the public domain, the gene code of an indigenous Hagahai man from Papua New Guinea, without evidence of prior informed consent on the part of the man or his people.

What's worse, the examples that we know about may represent little more than the tip of the iceberg. Although patents and other forms of intellectual property are officially part of the public record, they are little publicized.

The patenting of ayahuasca and other notorious examples of biopiracy such as the patents on neem or the patenting of the Hagahai man's genes, have been exposed only through the intervention of non-governmental organizations such as the Rural Advancement Foundation International (RAFI) and the Third World Network. Even then, as in the case of ayahuasca, it has often taken years before any particular patent is brought to light.

After learning about the patent on ayahuasca, COICA issued a press release warning indigenous peoples throughout the world about scientists and corporations who, "with the pretext of finding cures for serious diseases, are appropriating the plants and traditional knowledge of our peoples."

At the same time, COICA stated, indigenous peoples must intensify "our international campaign to achieve the recognition of our own intellectual property rights."

We urge you to share your support with:
Cultural Survival Canada
304-200 Isabella Street
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada K1S 1V7
Phone: 613-237-5361 Fax: 613-237-1547
Email:csc@cscanada.org