Biocultural community protocols for livestock keepers
So far, four livestock keeping communities, the Raika, Lingayat, Samburu and Pashtoon,
have developed biocultural protocols. These have increased the visibility of livestock
keepers as guardians of biological diversity, empowered the communities by making them
aware of their rights, contributed to the documentation of breeds and traditional knowledge
systems, inspired local communities to pursue conservation activities, and also contributed
to a feeling of global solidarity between livestock keepers. One unsatisfactory aspect is
the gender bias in the existing protocols which have been established by men, despite the
acknowledged role of women in the management of livestock.
There are also some criticisms and problems with the establishment of protocols. Among
these is the possible facilitation of biopiracy, as well as implicit acceptance of the prevalent
Intellectual Property Rights system. There are also problems with the term “community”,
which is criticized by many indigenous leaders. The process of establishing a biocultural
community protocol is time-consuming and should be endogenous; abuse by external actors must be avoided. There is a need for them to be backed by strong data on traditional
livestock breeding practices and scientofic complementarity. It is concluded that biocultural community protocols are an extremely valuable tool that has met with huge interest
among livestock keepers and has enormous potential for their empowerment. They should
be promoted widely through capacity-building, funding and dissemination of the results.
A number of recommendations are made to ensure maximum impact and success of this
promising new tool.
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