Talking heads can’t sustain biodiversity
14 Nov 2012 3:45 AM IST
The much publicised biodiversity convention in Hyderabad is finally over. While the news on the convention, more often than not, appeared with photographs of dances and cultural programmes, what went inside is brought out by the environmentalists as well as economists and international experts. However, the best of the critic came through the Peoples Biodiversity festival organised as a parallel endeavour by many organisations of farmers, adivasis, fish workers and rural poor. While $21 million was the budget planned for the international conference expecting participation of 193 countries, about 150 of them participated. More than debating and finally approving the financial contributions for carrying forward the process related to the convention on biodiversity and the Nagoya protocol, they could not even seek ratification to the Protocol (as officially approved at the United Nations level) from more than seven countries while 50 minimum ratifications are required to sign the protocol. Does this speak of the inefficiency or lack of calibre on the part of India during its precedence or is there anything basically wrong with content of the protocol itself? There indeed is.
Just as the other base and means adopted by the corporate world, that too from the seats of global power, one more principle of ‘access and benefits sharing’ seems to have been brought in. It is access to any and every resource, including land, water, forest, minerals as also the seeds, plants, species and wildlife that is being attained by the ‘investors’ of national and global capital at the cost of those who have retained all natural resources with diversity over generations. In order to legitimise their access even to those species that are rare and endangered, the corporates wants to have such protocols to covenants at the international level or just the policies and laws at the national level which would even justify the ecological destruction, degradation and resultant deprivation to displacement. The Special Economic Zones Act and forcible land acquisition under 16 various acts in India has always bypassed or manipulated comprehensive environmental impact assessments, in spite of the Environmental Protection Act, 1986, Forest Conservation Act 1980 and various notifications to legislations with protective goals. Presuming access to the generations old rich natural resources, be it seeds of aquatic wealth has been the principle behind all policies that have been invariably transferring the resources from the hands of those for who live sustainably with the same, to the urban-industrial world without ‘free, prior and informed consent’.
The benefits that go with such access in fact is not intended to be shared by the natural resource base communities rather those who justified the profits, huge or even vulgar, shared amongst the haves, if at all only with crumbs to the have-nots. The above principle in the protocol, with its true sense is indeed to go against the other principles in the CBD of sustainability, conservation and sharing benefits. The Nagoya protocol has come to include ‘access’ before benefit sharing exposing the real intention, almost amounting to conspiracy, by those who are vying and dying to seek access to the resources which are not only diverse but dispersed and hence decentralised and distant from the state power. The community resources forming parts of ecosystems, that may be as fragile as the Western Ghats, may thus be diverted to ‘powerful’ corporations like Lavasa. Similarly a precious macro ecosystem such as the Narmada or Bramhaputra river basins or the 7,500 km long coastal region of India may be sacrificed by the state in the name of development.
It is this state and actors within the statutory framework, who are hand in glow with the corporations, are seen as more easily manageable than the community themselves. Realising the impediments in having direct or even indirect access to the resources which are valuable in the market but invaluable to life and livelihood of the local populations; the corporate regime beyond country lines as also nation-state boundaries, has thus found its solace in seeking legitimacy and support of the state such as India. All this needs to be understood and not just reacted to, but challenged.
The national Biodiversity authority along with GEAC are the statutory agencies that are taking the regulatory role to themselves are seen more as a forum to monitor peoples’ reactions and facilitate the access to corporates even to the genetic resources, as has been brought out by a number of farmers’ organisations and associated activists. This has been the practice in every sector such as water and power where state wise regulatory authorities have invariably played a role in supporting privatisation more than public interest. The NBD itself has not been able to control the propagation of GM crops either through their field trails or interventions into the pricing mechanism.
On the other hand the state organs have facilitated research to technological extension work by the corporate, may it be Monsanto, Mahyco or Syngenta. The basic question therefore is while the state is claiming to be interested in conserving biodiversity and thus inflating its structural and policy interventions at the national or international level whether the communities can ever depend on those designs and possesses in order to protect and enrich their biodiversity.
Across the country there is hue and cry against the unjustifiable targets in power generations to industrialisation at the cost of not only biodiversity but on livelihood and cultural diversity as well. Our farmers to fish workers are crying halt from thermal to nuclear power plants or big dams as deliberate choice of technology pushed even without assessing impact on Biodiversity that is bringing in an irreparable damage to both nature and culture evolved through generations. It is this resistance that is being tried to be bypassed and proved to be unjustifiable and even illegal through the protocols like Nagoya protocol and the conventions such as CBD. Reading through those, one would realise that all the vagueness therein can be dangerously interpreted in favour of the corporates while they would pretend to share the benefits in cash with non-monetised communities but manipulated through market forces and mechanisms. Will this ever save Biodiversity or will it make more in roads into the intergenerational precious wealth that is natural? The conflict between the nature based communities and the global investor’s community is bound to get intensified.
The first ever example that has come up even before the conference in Hyderabad was fully wound up, is in the form of decision by the National Biodiversity Authority to remove the red sandals in Andhra Pradesh, the drought effected dry land forest species from the list of rare and endangered species. Claiming that this would help the species survive and grow, the NBA is also not concealing its intention to open up the species to the global market for its medicinal value and other usages without giving due weightage to the impact of the resultant laws of Natural Forest Cover. It is obvious that with almost no or little efforts by our ministries and state agencies to assess and save Biodiversity while promoting projects knowing to be killing ecosystems and with no special efforts in planning the land use to save even agricultural land, leave aside seed variety; the Indian state is obviously in a hurry to open up the access to the corporates, not just the Indian but the global ones as well.
The choice, therefore, is ours. Nagoya Protocol is neither signed by USA nor by any of the major ‘developed’ European countries, Indian state seems to have ratified it in a big haste. Why this? one may ask. Having opened up our education, health sector to the foreign direct investors; now in the name of preserving Biodiversity, they are in a game make even our Biodiversity regions accessible to the profit years. We have no choice but to counter such games by not only intensifying our struggles for community ownership, also for self-reliant planning with its own development vision.
Medha Patkar is founding-member of Narmada Bachao Andolan
Just as the other base and means adopted by the corporate world, that too from the seats of global power, one more principle of ‘access and benefits sharing’ seems to have been brought in. It is access to any and every resource, including land, water, forest, minerals as also the seeds, plants, species and wildlife that is being attained by the ‘investors’ of national and global capital at the cost of those who have retained all natural resources with diversity over generations. In order to legitimise their access even to those species that are rare and endangered, the corporates wants to have such protocols to covenants at the international level or just the policies and laws at the national level which would even justify the ecological destruction, degradation and resultant deprivation to displacement. The Special Economic Zones Act and forcible land acquisition under 16 various acts in India has always bypassed or manipulated comprehensive environmental impact assessments, in spite of the Environmental Protection Act, 1986, Forest Conservation Act 1980 and various notifications to legislations with protective goals. Presuming access to the generations old rich natural resources, be it seeds of aquatic wealth has been the principle behind all policies that have been invariably transferring the resources from the hands of those for who live sustainably with the same, to the urban-industrial world without ‘free, prior and informed consent’.
The benefits that go with such access in fact is not intended to be shared by the natural resource base communities rather those who justified the profits, huge or even vulgar, shared amongst the haves, if at all only with crumbs to the have-nots. The above principle in the protocol, with its true sense is indeed to go against the other principles in the CBD of sustainability, conservation and sharing benefits. The Nagoya protocol has come to include ‘access’ before benefit sharing exposing the real intention, almost amounting to conspiracy, by those who are vying and dying to seek access to the resources which are not only diverse but dispersed and hence decentralised and distant from the state power. The community resources forming parts of ecosystems, that may be as fragile as the Western Ghats, may thus be diverted to ‘powerful’ corporations like Lavasa. Similarly a precious macro ecosystem such as the Narmada or Bramhaputra river basins or the 7,500 km long coastal region of India may be sacrificed by the state in the name of development.
It is this state and actors within the statutory framework, who are hand in glow with the corporations, are seen as more easily manageable than the community themselves. Realising the impediments in having direct or even indirect access to the resources which are valuable in the market but invaluable to life and livelihood of the local populations; the corporate regime beyond country lines as also nation-state boundaries, has thus found its solace in seeking legitimacy and support of the state such as India. All this needs to be understood and not just reacted to, but challenged.
The national Biodiversity authority along with GEAC are the statutory agencies that are taking the regulatory role to themselves are seen more as a forum to monitor peoples’ reactions and facilitate the access to corporates even to the genetic resources, as has been brought out by a number of farmers’ organisations and associated activists. This has been the practice in every sector such as water and power where state wise regulatory authorities have invariably played a role in supporting privatisation more than public interest. The NBD itself has not been able to control the propagation of GM crops either through their field trails or interventions into the pricing mechanism.
On the other hand the state organs have facilitated research to technological extension work by the corporate, may it be Monsanto, Mahyco or Syngenta. The basic question therefore is while the state is claiming to be interested in conserving biodiversity and thus inflating its structural and policy interventions at the national or international level whether the communities can ever depend on those designs and possesses in order to protect and enrich their biodiversity.
Across the country there is hue and cry against the unjustifiable targets in power generations to industrialisation at the cost of not only biodiversity but on livelihood and cultural diversity as well. Our farmers to fish workers are crying halt from thermal to nuclear power plants or big dams as deliberate choice of technology pushed even without assessing impact on Biodiversity that is bringing in an irreparable damage to both nature and culture evolved through generations. It is this resistance that is being tried to be bypassed and proved to be unjustifiable and even illegal through the protocols like Nagoya protocol and the conventions such as CBD. Reading through those, one would realise that all the vagueness therein can be dangerously interpreted in favour of the corporates while they would pretend to share the benefits in cash with non-monetised communities but manipulated through market forces and mechanisms. Will this ever save Biodiversity or will it make more in roads into the intergenerational precious wealth that is natural? The conflict between the nature based communities and the global investor’s community is bound to get intensified.
The first ever example that has come up even before the conference in Hyderabad was fully wound up, is in the form of decision by the National Biodiversity Authority to remove the red sandals in Andhra Pradesh, the drought effected dry land forest species from the list of rare and endangered species. Claiming that this would help the species survive and grow, the NBA is also not concealing its intention to open up the species to the global market for its medicinal value and other usages without giving due weightage to the impact of the resultant laws of Natural Forest Cover. It is obvious that with almost no or little efforts by our ministries and state agencies to assess and save Biodiversity while promoting projects knowing to be killing ecosystems and with no special efforts in planning the land use to save even agricultural land, leave aside seed variety; the Indian state is obviously in a hurry to open up the access to the corporates, not just the Indian but the global ones as well.
The choice, therefore, is ours. Nagoya Protocol is neither signed by USA nor by any of the major ‘developed’ European countries, Indian state seems to have ratified it in a big haste. Why this? one may ask. Having opened up our education, health sector to the foreign direct investors; now in the name of preserving Biodiversity, they are in a game make even our Biodiversity regions accessible to the profit years. We have no choice but to counter such games by not only intensifying our struggles for community ownership, also for self-reliant planning with its own development vision.
Medha Patkar is founding-member of Narmada Bachao Andolan
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