By Siyang Borang
Unlike other forms of wealth, the treasure of plant genetic resources often fail to be revered by the general masses. To recalibrate our brain, we as an Arunachalees are the proud owner of 2nd highest forest cover in India and obviously 1stin the NE region. But, have we ever considered ourselves a rich man in that context?? Most of us would say if not cent percent, a big NO in bold letters. But why so much hullabaloo for this damn green thing present here and there and everywhere especially weeds causing a nuisance??
It’s the treasure present within them called the genes. Scientifically, genes are nothing but some protein however, they are the answer to our future ailments. Every place possesses their unique plant genetic resources besides common floras. This vegetation which are unique to a place gives the local communities some economic advantages if properly channelized and marketed. The prominent example of geographical indicator in our neighbourhood is the Darjeeling Tea. And just like declaring ownership to land resource, ownership of a plant species is also legally declared by the provision under Protection of Plant varieties and Farmers’ Rights Act 2001 and other Acts which give the local farming community, legal right to reap economic benefits via its commercial production.
A hidden problem called bio-piracy arises when there is commercial exploitation of a genetic material without the consent of or compensation to the indigenous people from where the genetic material or the knowledge was obtained. In world context, a prominent example of bio-piracy is the case of an American company RiceTec Inc. which in late 1997 succeeded in patenting the aromatic rice Basmati without prior consent from India and was marketing the same rice in brand names like Kasmati and Texmati.
Such cases of bio-piracy come into notice due to the vigilant and well aware locals but if such tragedy occurs here or who knows might already be occurring in our Arunachal context, no one would care or even be aware of it till it’s too late. Therefore, being proud owners of such huge plant genetic resources, it naturally becomes a prime duty of every indigenous Arunachalees to take good care of our Green Gold and be very carefulof any event of unauthorised access to our reservoir of Green Gold by prospective bio-pirates which may come in any form and anytime.
There are many cases of bio-piracy around the globe where most of them followed a common modus operandi where the bio-pirate simply take a handful of targeted soil or break a small part of the desired plant inside their pocket and simply leave with a mischievous grin. And after mass multiplication in-vitro, the bio-pirate may patent it successfully and yield economic benefits out of it without knowledge of the poor indigenous community which otherwise could have been compensated well.
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