The Economist, in a recent article, quoted Paul Horn, Senior vice-president and director, IBM Research, as saying that “Everything we do is aimed at avoiding a ‘handoff’—there is no ‘technology transfer’ and Intel executive Sean Maloney, reflecting that research is better “the closer the development is to the brutal market reality”. The article highlighted that for the world of computing, “innovation emerges from new ways of arranging today’s technologies rather than inventing new ones” (1).
Beyond polarized positions The above remarks seem to apply to a context where competition is fierce and time to market can be instantaneous. Would this be a valid observation when technologies are “relevant to the conservation and sustainable use of biological diversity or make use of genetic resources and do not cause significant damage to the environment”? (2).
Should Parties to the CBD fall into a polarized position, common elsewhere, focusing on the struggle between ‘competitive’ and ‘collaborative’ approaches? Is there any merit in a combination of the two strategies? Certainly, encouraging cooperation between government authorities and a competitive, business community will contribute positively to the 2010 goals and targets of the Strategic Plan.
At least this was a common understanding arising from the very beginning of the Convention. A pragmatic consensus for technology provisions exists under the Convention which recognises the dynamic dependence between biodiversity and biotechnology and the reality of a turbulent environment, such as that created by a high rate of innovation in products and processes based upon biological resources vis-à-vis issues such as environment protection, food security and public health.
What matters is achieving long-term scientific, technical and technological cooperation as the necessary means to the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity, in addition to specific technology transfer in exchange for access to genetic resources under specific agreed terms, according to the relevant provisions of the CBD agreement. Therefore, since both technology cooperation and the transfer of technology are essential contributions for the attainment of the three objectives of the Convention, and in particular to its third objective, Parties, international institutions, the business community, centers of knowledge, indigenous and local communities and other stakeholders should give priority to the strengthening of a durable and trustful relationship in the framework of the fair and equitable distribution of benefits arising out of the utilization of genetic resources.
ABS vision In the perspective of this long term relationship — one that has to ‘keep up’ or ‘evolve’ with advances in technology — the assemblage of a multilateral network of providers, users, intermediaries, researchers, regulators and other relevant stakeholders implies the strengthening of technical and organizational skills, both within the Conference of the Parties as such and in terms of the multiple links between Parties and specific providers and users.
The CBD acknowledges a reality with different developing countries at different levels of development, where access and the transfer of technology transfer, becomes the driving force of the economic, social and environmental dimensions of sustainability.
Beyond the privileged position that the technologically advanced regions enjoy today, some developing countries are quickly becoming an alternative source of qualified workers and smart innovators and should soon be in a position to assist others in establishing a technological base associated to genetic resources within and between developing regions.
However, many others are lagging behind and cannot be isolated from the benefits of institutional capacity development and opportunities for sustainable development of those resources.
Scaling up A network of Parties and other relevant stakeholders is expected to strengthen their links in particular with public, private and community institutions, with a view to creating opportunities, developing capacity and distributing benefits. This can be done, directly or indirectly, by enhancing the already robust CBD network, that is, by improving its density, stability and solidarity, and applying instruments on at least two interrelated levels:
Incentives for partnerships, following the logic of economies of global scale, relatively free from geographic location but needed to be committed to the overall CBD success; and
Incentives for partnerships, when highly territorialized problems and conditions of economies of agglomeration prevail, at the community level, including small to medium-sized enterprises.
In the interface of these two coping strategies, there is a need to scale-up concrete results in support of the CBD’s third objective: Investing in science and technology education, and engaging business to create incentives and promote an enabling environment for Foreign Direct Investment, as well as devising conducive mechanisms for building domestic technological capacity; and
Training and support of traditional and experimental knowledge in order to improve the qualification and skills of local communities, as well as the traceability, monitoring and control of their resources and their knowledge back and forth in the value chain.
Five success factors Sharing research results and technologies implies good reasons and specific motives. Among them, the flow of technology is an expected benefit arising out of authorized access to specific uses of genetic resources which makes sense according to the importance and relative concentration of genetic resources and traditional knowledge. But, what type of transfer of technology is possible, practical or right for a successful Access and Benefit-sharing (ABS) relation? It probably depends upon a series of factors including the following ones:
- Magnitude of the use of genetic resources as physical samples or genetic information;
- Criticality of access to biological samples or genetic information;
- Degree of substitution of the resource or of the provider;
- Degree of concentration of technical and organizational knowledge; and
- Capacity to enforce the rights of control and/or ownership over resources and knowledge.
The above factors define a collaborative strategy in advancing common goals in science and technology as well as supporting partnerships between research institutions and industry to develop specific skills along with a long term vision in favour of sustainable development of biological resources and the public interest.
Fernando Casas-Castañeda (
[email protected]) is Senior Advisor, Instituto Alexander von Humboldt and Co-Chair, Ad Hoc Open-ended Working Group on Access and Benefit Sharing, Convention on Biological Diversity.
(1) The Economist, 1 March 2007. “The rise and fall of corporate R&D. Out of the dusty labs”.
(2) Article 16, paragraph 1, Convention on Biological Diversity.
