PRESS RELEASE: 18 June 1997
For Immediate Release
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Bolivian Farmers Demand
Researchers Drop Patent
on Andean Food Crop
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FARMERS AND NGOS CALL ON UNITED NATIONS TO CONDEMN QUINOA PATENT AS THREAT
TO FOOD SECURITY AND VIOLATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS
Bolivia's National Association of Quinoa Producers (ANAPQUI) is asking two
professors at Colorado State University to abandon their controversial
patent on one of the country's most important food crops - quinoa
(Chenopodium quinoa) - a crop that feeds millions throughout the Andes,
including many Aymara and Quechua Indigenous People.
"Our intellectual integrity has been violated by this patent," said Luis
Oscar Mamami, ANAPQUI's President. "Quinoa has been developed by Andean
farmers for millenia, it was not 'invented' by researchers in North
America," said Mamani. "We demand that the patent be dropped and that all
countries of the world refuse to recognize its validity." Mr. Mamani will
travel to New York City on 22 June to make his appeal on behalf of quinoa
farmers at the United Nations where a Special Session of the General
Assembly will meet from 23-27 June. ANAPQUI will also present the quinoa
patent as a violation of Human Rights before the International Peoples'
Tribunal on Human Rights and the Environment, 22-23 June in New York City.
In a May 27 letter to Colorado State University professors Duane Johnson
and Sarah Ward, the producers' association points out that US Patent No.
5,304,718 grants Johnson and Ward exclusive monopoly control over a
traditional Bolivian variety known as "Apelawa," a quinoa type named for
the farmers of a Bolivian town of the same name near Lake Titicaca. The
patent, issued in 1994, is valid until the year 2011.
The patent claims the use of "Apelawa," a traditional Bolivian quinoa
variety as a source of male sterile cytoplasm in a technique to create
hybrid quinoa. But the US patent is not limited to a single hybrid variety,
it claims any quinoa hybrid that is derived from Apelawa. According to the
patent, this might include many traditional varieties grown by peasant
farmers in Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador and Chile as well as varieties important
in Bolivia's quinoa export market.
Though little known outside of the Andes, quinoa is becoming increasingly
popular in North America and Europe as an exceptionally nutritious food
crop. Johnson and Ward believe that their technique for hybridizing quinoa
will increase the crop's yield, making it better suited for commercial
production in the North.
International NGOs are joining ANAPQUI in protesting the US patent on
quinoa. "Bolivian farmers have every right to be alarmed," says Koos
Neefje of OXFAM UK, an international development NGO based in London. "We
join ANAPQUI in demanding that the patent be abandoned. It is a clear
threat to food security. The patenting of any food crop is morally
offensive, and should not be allowed by governments," concludes Neefje.
"The quinoa patent is a shocking example of biopiracy," states Pat Mooney,
Executive Director of the Rural Advancement Foundation International
(RAFI), an international NGO headquartered in Canada that first uncovered
the controversial patent. "Bolivian farmers and researchers were stunned to
learn of its existence. After all, they freely shared their quinoa seeds
and knowledge with the Colorado State professors. By slapping a patent on
quinoa the US researchers have selfishly appropriated knowledge and genetic
resources that belong to indigenous people of the Andes," explains Mooney.
Technically the owners of the quinoa patent have the right to prevent
imports of hybrid quinoa from entering the US if they are produced using
the Apelawa variety. One of the patent owners, Colorado State University
professor Duane Johnson, has already stated that he will donate the
technology to Andean countries and will not enforce the patent outside of
the United States. But Bolivian farmers and NGOs are not satisfied and
point out that male sterility in Andean farmers' varieties of quinoa has
been known for decades. "We don't need a US professor to 'donate' to us
what is rightfully ours," says Mamani.
"The issue is not simply quinoa," says Edward Hammond of RAFI. "There's
something terribly wrong when patent offices grant monopoly patents on food
crops - especially poor peoples' staple foods. This is a dangerous and
disturbing precedent, and it must not be allowed to stand. Access to food
and the universal Right to Food should not be left in the hands of those
who control patents on technology and germplasm," concludes RAFI's Hammond.
ANAPQUI will be joined by RAFI, the Indigenous Peoples' Biodiversity
Network and other NGOs at the UN General Assembly, 23 - 27 June in New York
City. The groups will ask the General Assembly to seek an Advisory Opinion
from the International Court of Justice (the World Court) on the moral
issues surrounding the patenting of food crops and other life forms.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:
RAFI Canada
Pat Mooney or Jean Christie
(613) 567-6880
RAFI-USA
Edward Hammond or Hope Shand
(919) 542-1396
ANAPQUI
Mr. Felix Gutierrez Matta
+ 591-2-372935
IBTA
Bolivian Institute of Agricultural Technology
Dr. Alejandro Bonifacio, Quinoa Breeder
+ 591-08-114028
OXFAM - UK
Simon Ticehurst
La Paz, Bolivia Office
+ 591-2-325789
The campaign to reject the quinoa patent claims is also supported by
Agricultural Missions (USA), Lutheran World Relief (USA), Canadian Lutheran
World Relief, IBIS (Denmark), Indigenous Peoples' Biodiversity Network
(IPBN) and Fundaci?n Bolinvest (Bolivia).