Plants for life: - Sacred Seeds Sanctuary

• In October 1991, the Costa RicanAsociacion Instituton Nacional deBiodiversidad (INBio), a private, nonprofit,scientific organization andMerck, a U.S. multi-nationalpharmaceutical corporation, signed atwo year agreement. In the agreement,INBio would supply Merck withsamples among the plants, insects andmicroorganisms collected from CostaRica’s protected forests. Merck thenwould have the right to use thesesamples to create new pharmaceuticalproducts. Merck paid one milliondollars to INBio for the right to analyzean agreed-upon number of indigenousplant and animal samples. Merck (it isbelieved) will pay INBio between one tothree percent royalties for any productdeveloped through the agreement.Ten percent of the initial one milliondollars and fifty percent of any royaltywill be invested in biodiversityconservation through Costa Rica’sMinistry of Natural Resources. (Tradeand Environment Database, no date).Clearly such agreements are beneficial inmany ways to countries rich in biodiversitybut without the capacity to develop theseresources. However, there are concernsthat such legislative measures may restrictaccess to plant resources for noncommercialuse such as research,conservation, education and display.Considering the key role that botanicgardens play in educating the publicabout medicinal plant use, access tomedicinal plants for education and displaypurposes as well as for conservation andresearch activities, is important. Botanicgardens have in recent years beenworking to develop harmonisedapproaches to implementing the ABSprovisions of the CBD. Two voluntaryapproaches have been developed,the Principles on Access to GeneticResources and Benefit-Sharing (thePrinciples) and the International PlantExchange Network (IPEN).• The Principles provide a framework tohelp guide gardens when developingtheir own individual policies.• IPEN establishes a system of facilitatedexchange for a network of gardens thathave signed up to a Common Code ofConduct. The IPEN system only coversnon-commercial use of livingcollections.Non-monetary benefits resulting fromplant exchange can include knowledgetransfer, technical support, staff exchangeand capacity building to strengthenconservation work in the country of originof the plant material.Further information can be found atwww.bgci.org/abs.Cultivation versus wild harvestCultivation has long been suggested as apossible mitigation to the unsustainablewild harvest of medicinal plants,simultaneously taking the pressure offwild stock whilst boosting commerce.Along an agronomic model, modernmethods of plant breeding, propagationand post-harvest processing techniquesPanax quinquefoliusPanax quinquefolius (Americanginseng) has been heavily traded inNorth America for over a century;“We were down in the Tennesseemountains when there came slowlydown the mountain trail a dilapidatedspecimen of humanity, slouch hat,bare foot, coat hung on one shoulder,and a sack, of unknown origin, in hishands. He saw us, heard us as wegreeted – but without turning the headslunk on like some phantom creatureinto the forest labyrinth. ‘Humph’,said the guide. ‘You might a’ known.You can’t expect nothin’ of a ginsengdigger.’”(Koch, 1910).It is highly prized as a universal remedy ineast Asia, where more than 95% ofharvested roots end up. Traded ginsengtypes include wild, wild-stimulated,cultivated woods-grown and cultivatedfields-grown. Field-grown ginseng rootsreach a size in three years that can only beattained by 15-30 years of growth undernatural forest conditions, and are very palein colour compared to wild-grown roots.Wild ginseng root has the greatestperceived medicinal value of all theginseng types and this is reflected inprice – from as much as US$1300/kg forwild roots to as low as US$44/kg forfield-cultivated roots (Pierce, 2002).Though there is a move towards gradingthe roots according to the quantity ofactive chemical content, buyers primarilygrade roots according to physicalcharacteristics; size (the bigger thebetter), shape (the more ‘man-shaped’and thicker the better), age (the olderthe better) and colour (the darker thebetter) (Sinclair, 2005).Illegal wild harvest is known to occur;10,515 illegally harvested roots wereseized between 1991 and 1999 in theGreat Smokey Mountain National Parkalone (Pierce, 2002). Conservationefforts have therefore includedemploying marker technology to enabledistinction between cultivated and wildroot, as well as research into the activecompound content. P .quinquefolius iswidely cultivated commercially, andrecorded in eight botanic gardencollections (PlantSearch database).12Plants for life: Medicinal plant conservation and botanic gardens