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Bioprospecting: A Text Analysis

Bioprospecting: A Text Analysis. Breanne Lott Global Health Capstone Project. Interest & Background. What’s the deal with ethnobotany and bioprospecting? How can we avoid biopiracy ? Why is this an important issue? Relevance to me and culmination of my undergraduate career.

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Bioprospecting: A Text Analysis

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  1. Bioprospecting: A Text Analysis Breanne Lott Global Health Capstone Project

  2. Interest & Background • What’s the deal with ethnobotany and bioprospecting? • How can we avoid biopiracy? • Why is this an important issue? • Relevance to me and culmination of my undergraduate career. • Perfect combination of Global Health and Biochemistry subjects. • Reflects the multi-dimensionality of Global Health- social justice, human rights, sustainability, cultural maintenance, and cross-cultural interactions.

  3. Research Question and Hypothesis • What will be the most prevalent themes in a variety of texts that aim to regulate the field of bioprospecting? • I hypothesized that in examining laws, rules, regulations and guidelines intended to govern the interactions of bioprospecting, themes of monetary gain and property rights will be the most prevalent.

  4. My Project • Content and thematic text analyses of 6 important documents written on bioprospecting. • United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) • World Trade Organization’s Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) • United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples • World Health Organization’s BioprospectingPolicy • Code of Ethics of the International Society of Ethnobiology • Mataatua Declaration on Cultural and Intellectual Property Rights

  5. Methods • I started with a simple content analysis of each text using an online text analysis software (textalyzer.net) to obtain: • Word frequency and top words • 3, 4 and 5 word phrases • Readability • Let’s Take a Look…

  6. 3, 4 and 5 Word Expressions and Context • From the World Trade Organization’s Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects • of Intellectual Property Rights - From the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples

  7. The Next Phase… Themes that I was particularly looking for: • Statements regarding money, payment, monetary or economic benefit, income, sharing of benefits, etc. • Reference to ownership over the traditional knowledge, property rights, intellectual property, access to resources • Concerns over sustainability, conservation, maintaining biodiversity • Acknowledgement of need for a multi-sectoral approach • Description of the desired relationship between parties • Recognition of the community’s self-identified needs/wishes, and overall respect for another culture • Law related aspects, agreements, enforcement, procedures, prior informed consent • Mechanisms for reaching goals, monitoring and regulation strategies • Reference to other documents on bioprospecting

  8. The Big One- CBD • An international treaty • Entered into force in 1993 • The 3 objectives as identified by the CBD are: • The conservation of biological diversity • The sustainable use of the components of biological diversity • The fair and equitable sharing of the benefits arising out of the utilization of genetic resources

  9. Pros & Cons • Honestly focused on doing the right thing • Comprehensive instead of sectoral • Is currently recognized by 192 States and the European Union • Not very enforceable, mostly suggestible • Very subjective, “as far as possible and as appropriate” • Absence of the US

  10. TRIPS- World Trade Organizations Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights • You can sense the Western culture in this text. It was based on models for intellectual property protection, a creation of industrialized societies. • Does not meet needs of developing countries. • Does not deal with collectively held property. • More precise, less over-arching than other texts.

  11. Conclusions • My original hypothesis was that themes of economic benefit and property rights would be most prevalent in the documents on bioprospecting. • What I found was that the documents were actually focused on a variety of topics and that monetary gain and ownership over intellectual knowledge did not dominate the majority of the texts. • The CBD was a pleasant surprise (but not enforceable). • The TRIPS agreement aligned most closely with my hypothesis.

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