Executive Summary
In this case study, Asociación ANDES (Peru), the International Institute for Environment and Development
(IIED), and the Potato Park present the results of the project “Protecting Community Rights over Traditional
Knowledge: Implications of Customary Laws and Practices.” This project included the development and
negotiation of the Inter-community Agreement for Equitable Access and Benefit Sharing, which proposed an
innovative approach to benefit sharing based on the use of indigenous customary laws, norms and practices.
The concept of Biocultural Systems (BCS)1, which understands processes, resources, knowledge and all
beings as reciprocal parts of an indivisible environment, was a guiding theory in this initiative. Accordingly, the
inter-community agreement took the form of a Biocultural Protocol.
The Nagoya Protocol on Access to genetic resources and Benefit Sharing requires countries to take measures
to ensure equitable benefit-sharing with indigenous and local communities (ILCs) for the use of traditional
knowledge and genetic resources held by them, based on mutually agreed terms and Prior Informed Consent.
As a result, countries shall take into account indigenous and local communities’ customary laws, community
protocols and procedures in implementing their obligations relating to traditional knowledge (TK), and will
endeavour to support the development by ILCs of community protocols for access to TK and equitable sharing
of benefits from its use. The Potato Park’s inter-community agreement provides a model for developing effective
community protocols which build the foundations for equitable and sustainable local economies, based on
biocultural goods and services, while building community capacity to negotiate equitable agreements with
third parties; these are termed biocultural protocols. It is one of the few examples of a community protocol
which is actually functioning in practice to guide the distribution of a range of monetary and non-monetary
benefits amongst communities.
Further, biocultural protocols are not only ‘external’ ABS and PIC tools, but also internal governance tools that
use customary laws and inputs from national and international law, adapted to local conditions, to regulate
interactions among biocultural resource users, and define and guide the behaviour of local networks. The
Potato Park protocols emerged from the Potato Park Biocultural System and, therefore, are embedded in
the traditional values, ethical norms, customary uses, and cultural and spiritual practices associated with the
biocultural resources of the Park. This interlacing of intercultural practice allowed participants in the research
process to link indigenous Andean legal principles, experiences, and norms to Western legislative models,
thereby providing clear guidance as to how indigenous biological and cultural resources may be appropriately
accessed and benefits equitably shared.
The Inter-community Agreement, developed through an in-depth participatory process facilitated by Quechua
community researchers over 2-3 years, provides a broad outline for equitable sharing of all the benefits
received by the Potato Park, directly or indirectly derived from its biocultural resources. Benefits from
different economic collectives are shared and reinvested in strengthening the biocultural system, through an
inter-community fund. Three core customary law principles that maintain biocultural systems were identified –
reciprocity, duality and equilibrium and from these principles, derivatives were identified and used to flesh out
the benefit-sharing framework, based on existing local norms and practices.
Development of the Inter-community Agreement of the Potato Park through participatory action research
has produced learning regarding how to design appropriate mechanisms for equitable benefit sharing. It
is the conviction of the researchers and community members involved in this study that, in order to design
appropriate mechanisms to implement sui generis systems that are practical and efficient, and at the same
time consistent with the aspirations, values and beliefs of indigenous and local communities, it is important to
abandon preconceived notions about access and benefit sharing agreements and the processes of obtaining
prior informed consent. A key starting point for developing sui generis systems is to analyze issues of
access agreements and consent processes from the perspective of the communities themselves; using as
the principal lens the customary norms that have thus far guided the preservation and maintenance of local
traditional knowledge (TK).
1 A complex, adaptive, linked social and ecological system and all of its subsystems and the relationships between them. These
relationships are co-evolving and self-organizing, producing rich biocultural diversity.
Community Biocultural Protocols
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