The Implications of the Existing International Environmental Regulatory Regimes of Access to and Benefit Sharing of Plant Genetic Resources
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Abstract
The implications of the regulatory regimes of access to and benefit sharing (“ABS”) of plant genetic resources (“PGRs”) under international legal instruments (“ILIs”) made on biodiversity are principally due to the mechanisms equipped with the regimes. Commencing with the aim of regulating PGRs, such mechanisms rely on intellectual property rights (“IPRs”) with the understanding that IPRs can solve the problem regarding ABS of PGRs. Paradoxically, it is such mechanisms that barricade equal access to PGRs and prevent the benefits from being fairly shared, rendering PGRs in the exclusive and negative area in the common space, eventually degrading biodiversity.
The evaluation of the ILIs demonstrates the tendency towards expanding the coverage of legally entitled actors and access channels to PGRs whilst retaining the measures of intellectual property law (“IPL”). Such tendency, nevertheless, supports IPRs to the extent that the regimes are stringent in allowing equal and fair ABS of PGRs to take place. Furthermore, the up-to-date measures cannot uplift the barrier based on state sovereignty. This dose not mean that IPL is unpleasant itself, rather, it pinpoints us to that if IPL as a legal measure in regulating PGRs is detrimental to the environment, we must rebuild a regulatory regime in the manner that simultaneously sustains biodiversity. The proposed approach may be based on some other means like the bank of PGRs where states parties are entitled to access them whereas benefits in the form of access entitlements can be traded – potentially taken as legal incentives and mechanisms to replace IPRs.
Keywords: Access to and Benefit Sharing of Plant Genetic Resources, International Environmental Law, Biodiversity, Environment
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