PROTECTING TRADITIONAL MEDICINAL KNOWLEDGE AND ASSOCIATED KNOWLEDGE HOLDERS THROUGH ACCESS & BENEFIT SHARING MODEL: AN INDIAN PERSPECTIVE

Abstract

India is a habitat to several biological resources, of which many such biological varieties are native only to this country and not found elsewhere. India proudly exhibits hugely rich traditional knowledge pertaining to these biological resources, in several forms starting from being incorporated in food habits, life habits, cultural expressions, medical use etc. But unfortunately, this traditional knowledge in India has not been adequately tapped in terms of generating revenue out of it or claiming ownership over the same because of lack of awareness among the holders of such knowledge regarding the means of protecting such knowledge against actual & potential threats. These threats come from the big pharmaceutical companies who take away the medicinal knowledge held by traditional medicinal knowledge holders (vaids & hakims) over medicinal plant genetic materials and utilize such knowledge to create patented medicine only to sell them to the people of same provider country, who give them the traditional knowledge. This paper will highlight the threat to such traditional knowledge and would focus on the role of Intellectual property protection in extending protection to such traditional knowledge holders pertaining to medicinal plants in the light of Access and Benefit Sharing mechanism, trying to come up with several ways of ensuring fair and equitable sharing of benefits with the benefit claimers in order to protect and promote their interests in consideration of the role played by them in conserving and protecting the biological diversity.