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LETTER TO THE EDITOR

• New biodiversity laws will retard ecological progress in developing tropical countries
• Literature Cited

New biodiversity laws will retard ecological progress in developing tropical countries

Ecological science has still not reached adulthood in many developing tropical countries, especially those in Southeast Asia (Sodhi & Liow 2000). For example, from 1996-1998, Acta Oecologia, Conservation Biology, Ecology, Functional Ecology, and Oecologia published only 0-12% research papers on southeast Asian, South American, and African biotas. Limited internationally-published ecological research in tropical developing countries could possibly be due a number of reasons including the primarily descriptive research (of little interest to international ecological journals) being conducted and because of ecological theories being poorly developed there (Barnard 1995). The consequences of a halt in still maturing ecology in these countries are heavy because of high biodiversity and rapid habitat loss. Deep ecological understanding is required for sound but urgent wildlife conservation decisions.

As stated by Grajal (1999), newly drafted and implemented biodiversity laws could halt much needed ecological progress in developing tropical countries (e.g., see Sarawak Biodiversity Regulations [1998] and the Andean Pact [Associated Press 1997]). These laws follow the Convention for Biological Diversity (CBD 1992), regulating and facilitating access to national genetic resources in order to conserve biodiversity and to prevent exploitation. There are two main problems. First, the new biodiversity laws could cause unnecessarily long delays for both foreign and local researchers in getting research permits. For bio-prospectors dealing with billion-dollar-industries, the wait may be worthwhile, but for students (constrained by course programs) or academics (constrained by research grant lengths) applying to do inventory or ecological work, bureaucratic delays may render projects infeasible. Second, if decision-makers of the research permit issuing office are not biologists, they may not understand the implications, basic procedures and principles of scientific research. As a result, biologists intending to document and study biodiversity in accordance with the hopes of the CBD may not be distinguished from bio-prospectors.

There is the understandable worry that indigenous and intellectual property rights are sometimes not respected when scientific research is conducted (Chung 1996). In some cases, commercial products were derived from natural products, without significant rewards being channeled to the country/community of origin (Baker et al. 1995).

In order not to halt the much required basic biodiversity and ecological research, we support that developing tropical countries have a "two-track" application process (Environmental Policy Workshop 1999). In a type I agreement, "researchers forgo the right to any future monetary benefits arising from commercialization and IPRs (Intellectual Property Rights)." In a type II agreement, "negotiations of IPRs and both monetary and non-monetary benefits" can proceed. This application process could speed up the approval of basic research projects by the quick identification of pure taxonomic, natural history, or ecological research as type I agreements. Additionally, local governments should leave research-permit decision-making to prominent local biologists. They should recognize that local as well as foreign researchers would ultimately provide insights into their precious national heritage--biodiversity.

The CBD has set out to safeguard biodiversity but unwittingly resulted in laws and practices that are hindering the collection of information needed for conservation biology. Without taxonomic, biogeographical, and ecological knowledge, we cannot begin to fathom how to conserve nature, the very matrix of our survival.

Literature Cited

Associated Press. 1997. Brazil's new biopiracy law. 5 July 1997. Associated Press, New York.

Baker, J. T., R. P. Borris, B. Carté, G. A. Cordell, D. D. Soejarto, G. M. Cragg, M. P. Gupta, M. M. Iwu, D. R. Madulid, and V. E. Tyler. 1995. Natural product drug discovery and development: new perspectives on international collaboration. Journal of Natural Products 58:1325-1357.

Barnard, P. 1995. Scientific research tradition and collaboration in tropical ecology. Trends in Ecology and Evolution 10:38-39.

Chung, F. J. 1996. Interests and policies of the state of Sarawak, Malaysia regarding intellectual property rights for plant derived drugs. Journal of Ethnopharmacology 51:201-204.

Environmental Policy Workshop. 1999. Access to genetic resources: an evaluation of the development and implementation of recent regulation and access agreements. School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University.

Grajal, A. 1999. Biodiversity and the nation state: regulating access to genetic resources limits biodiversity research in developing countries. Conservation Biology 13:6-10.

Sarawak Biodiversity (Access, Collection and Research) Regulations. 1998. The Sarawak Government Gazette Part II 53( 55).

Sodhi, N. S., and L. H. Liow. 2000. Improving conservation-biology research in Southeast Asia. Conservation Biology 14:1211-1212.

Lee Hsiang Liow (Swedish Biodiversity Centre, CBM, Box 7007, 750 07, Uppsala, Sweden) and Navjot S. Sodhi (Department of Biological Sciences, National University of Singapore, Kent Ridge, Singapore 119260, Republic of Singapore, dbsns@nus.edu.sg)

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