Critiques and problems
A
about community protocols and their impacts have been
expressed by civil society organizations. They relate both to the concept in general as
well as the process of establishing the protocol.
NUMBER OF RESERVATIONS
Biopiracy
There have been several cases in which companies or other outsiders have used traditional
knowledge about the medicinal value of plants to develop commercial products without sharing any of the proceeds or benefits with the communities who were the original knowledge
holders. There also concerns that the details contained in protocols could actually facilitate
biopiracy by alerting outsiders to the presence of valuable genetic resources. According
to them, the establishment of biocultural protocols could facilitate and pave the way for
pirating genetic traits that would enable adaptation of commercial production systems to
climate change. Such interest would not only relate to specific breeds, but even to so-called
“non-descript animals”. It has been recommended to genotype indigenous breeds and then
to keep the information secret and in a safe place (Suman Sahai, pers. comm., 2009).
By contrast, animal genetic resources experts note that there is currently no commercial
interest in locally adapted breeds and regard such a scenario as unlikely (Hoffmann, 2010).
Yet, the case of the Red Maasai sheep, that was discouraged locally while at the same time
continuing to be the subject of intense interest among scientists and the sheep industry in
Australia, is reason for caution.
Certainly, there is the possibility that unique traits of local breeds would become known
through the biocultural community protocols, thereby precipitating interest among governments, scientists or commercial operators and leading them to purchase animals of
the breed. This would raise the question whether this would be “good” or “bad” for the
“community”: it could actually be beneficial by creating income or increasing prices, but
it could also be harmful if the community sells out its genetic resources and neglects to
keep its female breeding animals.
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