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Express News Service
NEW DELHI: In a step towards the documentation and preservation of India’s rich biological diversity, the Union government on Tuesday launched a national campaign for the updation and verification of People’s Biodiversity Registers (PBR).
A legal document containing comprehensive accounts on local bio-resources, PBRs are also created to record traditional knowledge and practices. The government also hopes these will be a milestone in biodiversity conservation.
PBRs are also India’s effort to save its resource from bio-piracy – known as scientific colonialism. In the absence of PBR-like documents, Indian products like neem, turmeric, tamarind, basmati, and Darjeeling tea were patented by foreign firms for commercial exploitation.
To protect biopiracy, the UN agency, the World Intellectual Property Organization, formed an inter-governmental committee on intellectual property, genetic resources, traditional resources and folklore.
Under that agreement, India made the law’ Biodiversity Act 2002’ under which National Biodiversity Authority (NBA) was constituted. So far, NBA has constituted 2.77 lakh Biodiversity Management Committees (BMCs) across the country to document various aspects of biodiversity.
This covers habitat conservation, preservation of land races, folk varieties and cultivars, domesticated stocks and breeds of animals, micro-organisms, and the accumulation of knowledge related to local biological diversity.
BMCs consist of the local elderly, farmers, pastoralists, teachers and students. Till now, BMCs have prepared around 2.67 lakh PBRs. “The objective of this campaign is to bring consistency and standardisation in all 2.67 lakh PBRs,” says Ashwini Kumar Choubey, Union Minister of State for Environment, Forest and Climate Change.
“BMCs have documented in different formats, which we need to standardise it,” he said, while detailing on the progress in digitising PBRs, as well as transforming them into e-PBR.The ministry has brought 5% of all states BMCs reports and members to Goa, who engaged in its preparation. They provided training to members on how to document it further.
NEW DELHI: In a step towards the documentation and preservation of India’s rich biological diversity, the Union government on Tuesday launched a national campaign for the updation and verification of People’s Biodiversity Registers (PBR).
A legal document containing comprehensive accounts on local bio-resources, PBRs are also created to record traditional knowledge and practices. The government also hopes these will be a milestone in biodiversity conservation.
PBRs are also India’s effort to save its resource from bio-piracy – known as scientific colonialism. In the absence of PBR-like documents, Indian products like neem, turmeric, tamarind, basmati, and Darjeeling tea were patented by foreign firms for commercial exploitation.googletag.cmd.push(function() {googletag.display(‘div-gpt-ad-8052921-2’); });
To protect biopiracy, the UN agency, the World Intellectual Property Organization, formed an inter-governmental committee on intellectual property, genetic resources, traditional resources and folklore.
Under that agreement, India made the law’ Biodiversity Act 2002’ under which National Biodiversity Authority (NBA) was constituted. So far, NBA has constituted 2.77 lakh Biodiversity Management Committees (BMCs) across the country to document various aspects of biodiversity.
This covers habitat conservation, preservation of land races, folk varieties and cultivars, domesticated stocks and breeds of animals, micro-organisms, and the accumulation of knowledge related to local biological diversity.
BMCs consist of the local elderly, farmers, pastoralists, teachers and students. Till now, BMCs have prepared around 2.67 lakh PBRs. “The objective of this campaign is to bring consistency and standardisation in all 2.67 lakh PBRs,” says Ashwini Kumar Choubey, Union Minister of State for Environment, Forest and Climate Change.
“BMCs have documented in different formats, which we need to standardise it,” he said, while detailing on the progress in digitising PBRs, as well as transforming them into e-PBR.The ministry has brought 5% of all states BMCs reports and members to Goa, who engaged in its preparation. They provided training to members on how to document it further.
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