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India to pitch for comprehensive biodiversity pact

New Delhi, Oct 15 (PTI) India today said it would pitch for a comprehensive protocol to preserve biodiversity and insist on inclusion of human genetic resource and entire value chain of derivative of bioresource in such a document. Indian interlocutors will press for inclusion of human genetic resource or human pathogens and derivative of bioresource in the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) which will be negotiated in Nagoya, Japan next week. Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh today said agreement on derivative and human pathogen would be the "make or break" issue for India and would form the red lines for the negotiators. India has been insisting on inclusion of human pathogens and the entire value chain involving derivative of a bioresource to be included in the agreement of access and benefit sharing (ABS), Ramesh said. The developed nations have been insisting on having separate regime for human pathogens and also want to limit the ABS to the primary source of the derivative. Nagoya will host the 10th Conference of Parties (CoP) to the Convention on Biological Diversity between October 18 and 29 when representatives of 192 countries are expected to discuss access and benefit sharing issues with regard to biodiversity. Ramesh would reach Nagoya on October 23 to participate in the ministerial level talks. The three pillars of the convention are conservation, sustainable development and fair use of resources. But the argument over patenting and paying royalties for those resources, among other issues, has fuelled a protracted fight. India and Brazil lead a group of 17 nations -- the Group of Like-Minded Megadiverse Countries -- to combat biopiracy. Besides human pathogens and derivatives, the date of operationalisation of the CBD is also one of the sticking points. A section of the developing nations is in favour of the agreement being operationalised with retrospective effect while others want it to be implemented from a specific date. "We cannot go back in time and say that the agreement will be applicable from a retrospective date. India's view is that we cannot go back in history," Ramesh said. He said while India favours making the Patent Office as a point of control as it is the first place where violation of intellectual property or use of traditional knowledge could be detected, the rich nations are uneasy with the proposal. India also favoured having complete disclosure with regard to exploitation of biodiversity while developed nations insist on graded disclosure. Ramesh said while efforts would be made to reach an agreement on the Nagoya Protocol, the talks, if inconclusive, could continue in 2012 when Delhi hosts the 11th CoP.