New Internationalist – September 2019

THE BIG STORY

makes me squirm is that 98 per cent of
patent sequences are owned by entities in
just 10 rich countries.^3 That means about
170 countries have basically no stake at
the moment.
That, to me, just doesn’t resonate
with any of these international commit-
ments to equality, to equity, to transfer of
technology.
Right now the UN is in the middle of
a process to negotiate a conservation and
sustainable use treaty for the ocean’s bio-
diversity.^4 The fourth [and last] meeting
is in March 2020, at the end of which
there may be a treaty ready for signing
by member countries.

How are the talks going?
One of the challenges is that the science
moves faster than policy. Look at genetic
resources on land, regulated under the
Nagoya Protocol for the past few years.
The Protocol took 20 years to get going
and during this time the biotechnology
industry changed so dramatically that by
the time the treaty was signed it did not
match the purpose it was designed for.
I think there is a real risk that even
really well-intentioned negotiators are
going to create a new treaty that does not
have the outcome people hope for.
The golden outcome is that everyone
involved has equal access, everyone is
able to participate and this leads to a lot
of new advances in the medical industry
and in biotech more broadly, and that
these benefits are disseminated around
the world and they help to spur a blue
economy that’s sustainable and lasting.
I think the other direction it can go
is that people get so nervous about the
inequity and inequality that seem to be
characterizing the industry right now,
that they become very protective of
access to these resources, very stringent
about benefit-sharing so that it becomes
a barrier for corporations and academic
organizations that are interested in
going out and doing research. That ends
up harming everyone because then you
don’t have this research and development
and you don’t have any benefits to share
with anyone.
So, there are two different poles and
it’s hard to know which direction we are
going in now.

Companies like BASF must be watching
keenly. Is there much lobbying?
We were surprised to see that BASF
were responsible for so many of the

sequences. They are investing nearly €2

billion ($2.2 billion) a year in research

and development. It’s part of the core

operating strategy of this industry. It

took us a while, but we were able to have

a conversation with a representative of

BASF. We explained our findings and we

asked them: Do you understand why the

company has such a dominant position?

And they were surprised, I think, hon-

estly surprised. One of the reasons is that

if you compare the number of patents

associated with marine biodiversity with

those associated with terrestrial biodi-

versity, it’s a drop in the bucket, almost

nothing for them. But a small island state

in the Pacific, which has the biodiversity

in its jurisdiction and is also looking

for some way to participate in the blue

economy, may have a very different per-

spective. Maybe it’s not an issue of scale

but ethics and bioethics.

What are BASF doing with the patents

they’ve got?

This is one of the things we asked.

We learned it was likely related to big

investment in polyunsaturated fatty

acids [PUFAs, such as Omega-3] known

to have beneficial health impacts. It’s

important for early child brain develop-

ment, is a dietary supplement, and found

in high concentrations in fish, especially

small fish.

They’ve been able to splice genes of

marine micro-organisms into a land

crop, canola, to produce an oil that is very

high in Omega-3. There are implications

for aquaculture too. If you feed salmon

soya, they grow but they are not as nutri-

tious to eat as if you feed them on small

fish. Land crops rich in PUFAs could be

fed to salmon, leaving more small fish for

people to eat. This has implications for

land use and the ocean system. So, this

one innovation, using genetic resources,

could reshape the aquaculture industry

and international food systems.

What do you think should happen?

Marine biotechnology is a rapidly

expanding industry and it has the poten-

tial to be one that’s sustainable. It’s not

like seabed mining. If you collect a little

bit of genetic sample from some place

you are not going to be destroying eco-

systems on a massive scale. It ticks a lot of

boxes for being a positive growth sector

for the blue economy. I really hope that

the industry is not just limited to a small

number of countries, and since this is

an industry that is now being regulated

it seems like a good opportunity to get

things right.

You and your colleagues have proposed

that everyone should disclose the sample

origin of marine genetic data.

Transparency is low-hanging fruit, for

academics and for industry too. It sets

norms for the industry and can shine a

light on the bad actors.^5

Another idea being discussed is that

a certain percentage of all commercial

profits related to innovations based on

marine genetic resources from areas

beyond national jurisdiction should go

into a fund for capacity-building in the

least-developed countries.

And another idea is that any genetic

material collected in areas beyond

national jurisdiction should be in freely

accessible public databases. The down-

side is that poor countries that do not

have a biotech industry may get access

but they cannot really use it. So, put

bluntly, you may be giving highly indus-

trialized countries a leg up to find all

the good stuff first, and patent it before

others catch up.

Isn’t the answer not to have patents on

marine genetic material, full stop? It

can’t be owned by anyone?

The patent system makes me scratch

my head sometimes. Maybe there

shouldn’t be any capacity for protecting

these innovations... But then you think

of these giant multinationals that are

pouring millions of R&D money into

some new pharmaceutical that could

benefit humanity. If they are not able to

get patent protection, they don’t put that

money in and we never get that pharma-

ceutical. There are no simple answers, it

seems. O

1 Robert Blasiak et al, Advances in Science, nin.tl/

control-of-marine-genes

2 The other scientists are: Jean-Baptiste Jouffray,

Colette Wabnitz, Emma Sundström and Henrik

Österblom.

3 The countries (in descending order) are: Germany,

US, Japan, Israel, Britain, Norway, France, Denmark,

Canada, Netherlands.

4 UN, nin.tl/marine-biodiversity-conference

5 R Blasiak, Trends in Ecology and Evolution, nin.tl/

scientists-should-disclose

30 NEW INTERNATIONALIST