Reblog de IPS News

Stephen Leahy

BROOKLIN, Canada, Mar 20 (IPS) - The Pacific region has long been a favourite target of gene hunters, unethical bio-researchers and "patent bottom trawlers" looking to profit from its unique flora, fauna -- and human beings.

Pacific Islanders have had their genes patented against their will. T-cells from the Hagahai tribe in Papua New Guinea can be purchased today on the internet for 216 dollars.

Cook Islanders were nearly the subjects of an experiment to transplant pig parts into humans in 2002. Had it proceeded, the U.S. would have labelled the Cook Islands a "rogue state" over fears about the potential spread of virulent pig retroviruses in humans, according to a new book launched by co-publishers Call of the Earth Llamado de la Tierra, and the United Nations University.

Call of the Earth Llamado de la Tierra is an independent indigenous initiative on intellectual property rights and traditional knowledge.

"The book is a catalogue of unethical experiences in the Pacific region," said Aroha Mead, a senior lecturer at Victoria University in Wellington, New Zealand, and co-editor of the book "Pacific Genes and Life Patents", launched at the university Tuesday.

"There's been a lot of bad behaviour here. Many researchers from the outside have a colonial attitude," Mead told IPS from Wellington.

An absence of regulation and widespread naiveté regarding the latest genetic technologies and intellectual patent law has made the region a major target for commercial "gene hunters" or bio-prospectors, she says, likening gene pirates to deep-sea trawlers that scoop up everything in their path -- and then claim intellectual property rights to anything they think might have commercial value in the future.

"Genes are a key resource of the new world bio-economy and our isolation and diversity makes the Pacific Islands particularly attractive," writes contributor Te Tika Mataiapo - Dorice Reid, a traditional chief from the Cook Islands.

The modern bio-economy crashes head on with traditional cultural and spiritual values in the South Pacific, Reid adds.

One of the first collisions was in the early 1990s. Without informing individuals, their communities or governments, the U.S. government filed patents on DNA cells taken from the Hagahai tribe in Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands. The patent application was eventually dropped, but cell lines derived from their unique DNA remain in use and for sale.

The region retains strong traditional cultural beliefs, which means that even if individuals had consented, the genetic material donated would reflect an entire extended family's genetic makeup and their permission would be needed as well.

"In South Pacific cultures, a plant is a living ancestor -- and even a drop of human blood retains its life spirit after it has been collected for medical research or synthesised and specific DNA qualities isolated," said A.H. Zakri, director of the United Nations University's Yokohama-based Institute of Advanced Studies.

"We hope this book helps advance international understanding" of these deeply-held values, Zakri said in a statement.

"Plants and animals are not seen as mere physical or biological entities but also as embodiment of ancestral spirits," writes co-editor Steven Ratuva of Fiji, a senior fellow at the University of the South Pacific.

In Fijian cosmology, the genetic materials that make up plants and animals are considered part of the circle of life and are sacrosanct. Moreover, medicinal plants are considered common property and available for everyone

Patents have also been taken out on extracts from many plants Islanders have used for thousands of years, including Kava, Taro, Canarium Nut and others.

"Patents are not a tool of humanitarian research. They are a tool of commerce and exclusive property rights and serve to give signals to others 'stay away, they're mine. I own them'," Mead writes.

Such action violates Islanders' traditional values of "pono" and "tika" (to act appropriately), where everyone benefits from the use of a plant, including individuals, their families, and communities.

Pacific Islanders suffer from very high rates of Type-2 diabetes, and in 2002, some researchers claimed that transplanting pancreas cells from pigs into diabetics offered a potential cure. Unable to properly assess the proposed experiment, the Cook Island government agreed. The international medical community objected and then local indigenous leaders protested, writes Reid.

Pacific Island states generally have great difficulty staying abreast of developments in biotechnology and developing legislation to cope with social, legal, and ethical implications of the new technologies, she says.

"It is very difficult for poor communities to resist research proposals that promise free health services and other things in exchange for blood or DNA samples," says Mead.

One solution is to create a regional Pacific intellectual property office to assess patent and trademark applications, informed by Pacific model laws and responses. Such an office could enable patent application assessments to be carried out in a more critical manner with regard to Pacific cultural heritage.

The Cook Islands have just set up a research office to screen all research proposals, says Mead.

"That's a good step forward. I hope more governments will do this," she said.

Patents and biotechnology are not going to help solve the problems facing the Pacific region, she and others in the book note. Poverty, poor health care and rising sea levels with climate change are among the main challenges the region faces.

"We don't need any more researchers coming here just to be the first to discover something," Mead concluded. (END/2007)