Governance and Micropolitics of Traditional ... - IPRsonline.org

is opposed to ex situ resources which occur in ‘simulated’ environments 31 . Ex situ
conservation of biological diversity has the advantage of saving genetic material, or
individual examples from a species that could be threatened or may become extinct. Genetic
material can thus be utilised in controlled research, or used to reintroduce a species back to
the environment. Ex situ conservation has the disadvantage of removing the genetic material,
individual plant or organism from its original environment, such that it will no longer be
influenced by the same environmental conditions, such as climate, soils and interactions with
other species (including humans).
Ex Situ Biological Resources, Government Policy and Access
Thailand has a history of making donations to CGIAR research centres, particularly IRRI, and
cooperation with their research projects. At the same time that the IARCs were being
established in Thailand genebanks were also established and administered by government
departments and in universities for research and academic purposes.
As a guide this section describes some of the current requirements for accessing biological
material from ex situ sources in Thailand. It should be noted this is an area where laws,
regulations, policy and standards regularly change, and thus it should be taken only as a
guideline.
In Thailand there is no standard for accessing material, but rather several depending upon the
provider body. Government bodies where genetic resources are accessible include the
Department of Agriculture which maintains a bank of crop and plant germplasm; the Insititute
for Thai Traditional and Alternative Medicines which maintains a herbarium of potential
herbal remedies and tonics; and Biotec, which maintains a culture collection of primarily
fungi, but also some other micro-organisms.
The Department of Agriculture was the first department to establish a Material Transfer
Agreement (MTA) policy, and a policy of permission to access genetic resources (similar to a
PIC policy), as a result of a research project into facilitation of MTAs in Thailand. These
policies should in theory apply to ex situ and in situ genetic resources, as the department
policy operates concurrent to the PVP Act. For example if a researcher seeks to obtain a strain
of rice held by either the DoA or a local strain registered by a farming community, they must
approach the DoA. When the Ministerial Regulations of the PVP Act are passed by the
Council of State and Cabinet it is assumed that they will formally establish a standard MTA.
At the moment those who wish to research and breed using crop germplasm held or
administered by the department or under the PVP Act, they must gain permission as per DoA
policy and sign an MTA. If something new is found as a result, they must provide a
proportion of the profits in a benefit sharing arrangement as stipulated by contract also to be
established by the Ministerial Regulations of the PVP Act (Tithipraesert, Wichar. Pers.
Comm., 6 th May 2005; and Changtavorn, Thanit. Pers. Comm., 1 st June 2005).
The Department of Public health (DPH) has adopted a similar policy and is also waiting on
Ministerial Regulations to be passed in relation to the Act on Protection and Promotion of
31 There may be very broad interpretations of what constitutes ‘natural’ and ‘simulated’ environments. For the
sake of this discussion, natural environments include national parks, wilderness areas, farms, and open green
space. Simulated environments relate to significantly controlled conditions in laboratories, herbariums, enclosed
storage, greenhouses or similar.
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