[IP] The chapati patent
Delivered-To: dfarber+@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date: Sun, 01 Feb 2004 09:01:31 -0500
From: Srini Ramakrishnan <cheeni@xxxxxxx>
Subject: [For IP] The chapati patent
To: David J Farber <dfarber@xxxxxxx>
Will Tortillas and Pizzas be next?
-Srini
http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,1135675,00.html
Monsanto's chapati patent raises Indian ire
Randeep Ramesh in New Delhi
Saturday January 31, 2004
The Guardian
Monsanto, the world's largest genetically modified seed company, has been
awarded patents on the wheat used for making chapati - the flat bread staple
of northern India.
The patents give the US multinational exclusive ownership over Nap Hal, a
strain of wheat whose gene sequence makes it particularly suited to
producing crisp breads.
Another patent, filed in Europe, gives Monsanto rights over the use of Nap
Hal wheat to make chapatis, which consist of flour, water and salt.
Environmentalists say Nap Hal's qualities are the result of generations of
farmers in India who spent years crossbreeding crops and collective, not
corporate, efforts should be recognised.
Monsanto, activists claim, is simply out to make "monopoly profits" from
food on which millions depend. Monsanto inherited a patent application when
it bought the cereals division of the Anglo-Dutch food giant Unilever in
1998, and the patent has been granted to the new owner.
Unilever acquired Nap Hal seeds from a publicly funded British plant gene
bank. Its scientists identified the wheat's combination of genes and
patented them as an "invention".
Greenpeace is attempting to block Monsanto's patent, accusing the company of
"bio-piracy".
"It is theft of the results of the work in cultivation made by Indian
farmers," said Dr Christoph Then, Greenpeace's patent expert after a meeting
with the European Commission in Delhi.
"We want the European Patent Office to reverse its decision. Under European
law patents cannot be issued on plants that are normally cultivated, but
there are loopholes in the legislation."
A spokesperson for Monsanto in India denied that the company had any plan to
exploit the patent, saying that it was in fact pulling out of cereals in
some markets.
"This patent was Unilever's. We got it when we bought the company. Really
this is all academic as we are exiting from the cereal business in the UK
and Europe," said Ranjana Smetacek, Monsanto's public affairs director in
India.
Campaigners in India say that there are concerns that people might end up
paying royalties to Monsanto for making or selling chapatis.
"The commercial interest is that Monsanto can charge people for using the
wheat or take a cut from its sale," said Devinder Sharma, who runs the Forum
for Biotechnology and Food Security in Delhi.
The potential market in developing countries is huge. Rice production in
India alone exceeds that of the American maize market.
The number of patents relating to rice issued every year in the US has risen
from less than 100 in the mid-1990s to more than 600 in 2000.
Mr Sharma says there is little hope of the Indian government intervening to
prevent the chapati being patented by Monsanto.
It simply cannot afford the legal fees, having spent hundreds of thousands
of dollars fighting a US decision to grant a Texan company a patent on
basmati rice in 1997.
That case became a cause celebre for the anti-globalisation protests of the
1990s, and was only settled when the patent was watered down.
"The ministry of commerce sent a circular out last year which said that
there is no money to fund these cases any more," said Mr Sharma.
-------------------------------------
You are subscribed as roessler@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
To manage your subscription, go to
http://v2.listbox.com/member/?listname=ip
Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/