The worldwide extension of patent regime on life forms has raised new concerns for both agriculture and public healthcare sectors. The frequency of bio-piracy has also increased. Attempts to patent turmeric, neem fungicide, basmati rice, naphal wheat landrace and method of preparing wheat flour are few of the several recent examples of how traditional knowledge of countries was sought to be misappropriated.

Swiss biotech giant Syngenta has recently sought patent rights over thousands of gene sequences of rice. Rice is the staple food in most countries and if Syngenta is accorded patent rights over these gene sequences, it would practically “own” the world’s staple crop. The company has filed for patent rights before the European Patent Office, US Patent and Trademark Office and the World Intellectual Property Organization. It has claimed that most of gene sequences it has “invented” are identical in other crops and therefore the patent needs to be extended to other crops like wheat, corn, sorghum, rye, banana, soyabean, some fruits and vegetables.

There are also reports of more than 4,000 out of 24,000 discovered human genes being patented in the US. The patent right holders are mainly private companies like Incyte, A Palo Alto and universities. The US patent treats human DNA as any other chemical product. It recognizes minor changes as innovation.

Patenting of genes resulted in boom for biotech companies in 1980s and 1990s. Earlier most of the research institutions and companies were in favour of a strong patent regime on life forms as they thought it would promote research. It was only the NGOs, which were opposed to this from the very beginning. But as the current situation has come to mean a total monopoly on life forms, a rethinking has begun amongst researchers and companies who now think that such a patent regime is a hindrance to future research. Some of them even say that the situation is leading to what can be called “scientific apartheid.”

( www.financialexpress.com)