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Diversity and Protectionism
Use of Genebanks: Trends and Interpretations
Speech by Cary Fowler Agricultural University of Norway and Senior Advisor to IPGRIgaggahajajkakakakkak
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I wish to make the important distinction between
access to and availability of plant genetic
resources for food and agriculture (PGRFA),
and about the question of where the real value
in PGRFA resides. Much of the noise of
modern political discourse concerns access and
benefit sharing; too little concerns availability
and the question of how best the value and
utility of PGRFA might be recognised and
enhanced.
To set the stage, a brief trip back into history
may be helpful. At least three discernable, if
poorly delineated, periods of plant and genetic
resource acquisition/transfer may be seen.
In none of these is the story quite what you
would expect from reading political tracts
on the subject.
- Ancient (Domestication to 1492): During this
period spices and plants with medicinal
qualities were the main subjects of acquisition,
though the Sumarians collected vines, figs
and roses in Asia Minor as early as 4500 BC.
In general, there was no great difference in
the capacity of one group or society versus another
to utilise the materials. While the collectors
were probably not adhering to the FAO
Code of Conduct in their activities, there may
not have been large conflicts. But who knows?
- Colonial: The focus during this period was
on industrial and plantation crops (tea, coffee,
rubber, oil palm, cinchona, and indigo for
example). By the time the first European set foot
in the New World, maize had spread from
Mexico to the tropical forests of Brazil and the
Andean highlands. The spread of crops within
the Americas and between Europe, Africa and
Asia, largely accomplished before the colonial
era, continued with the “Colombian Exchange.”
For the most part, the aim was to acquire
species as opposed to within-species diversity
(though French sought to broaden variability
of nutmeg and cloves). Medicinals continued to
be important. Seeds and planting materials
were collected, sometimes with the active opposition
of local people. Colonial powers had
the means to organise production systems and
capitalise handsomely from their botanical
acquisitions.
- Modern (1800s): During the modern period,
imports and distribution of crop diversity were
made in high numbers. The U.S. government,
for instance, distributed 20 million packets of
seed to farmers and gardeners in 1897 as
part of a long-standing programme to introduce
crops/diversity and promote adaptation and
breeding in the country. From the 1940s onwards,
concerted and well-organised efforts
were made to collect genetic diversity for use
in crop improvement programmes. Interest
in plants of potential pharmaceutical value resurfaced
in the 1980s.
Materials had been
collected for breeding programmes, but until the
1980s acquisition was not particularly controversial.
PGRFA was considered the “common
heritage” of humankind. For most of this
period, the technologies used to develop PGRFA,
like the PGRFA itself, were in the public domain
and available to all. With the advent of
the new biotechnologies and the application
of intellectual property rights laws to biological
materials, the picture began to change and
by the 1990s differences in capacity to use again
emerged along with restrictions in access.
The three periods are distinguished not so much
by the calendar but by what was collected;
the level of technology employed and how it
was used; and the capacity of the collector
and donor to exploit the biological materials,
through technology and law.
Today, one might argue that the issue of “capacity
to use” underlies most debates on PGRFA –
the fact that someone else can do something with
the materials that you can’t. The issue is
not, strictly speaking, about loss of property.
Biological materials are not like gold; they
can reproduce, thus their acquisition or removal
does not diminish one’s own property – it is
how the material is used that poses the threat.
It is about loss of opportunity, loss of commercial
advantage. It is also about not giving
any advantage to those you perceive to be
adversaries. There is a strong “zero-sum” mentality
evident in the discourse over PGRFA:
“Your gain is my loss.”
Germplasm Flows
It is certainly true that much of the diversity of
cultivated crops now stored in genebanks
was first found in and acquired from farmers’
fields in developing countries. It is also
true, that most of the crops and a considerable
amount of their associated diversity had
already departed their centres of origin long
before the modern era. The history of the
spread of crops is a fascinating story, but one
must be careful in drawing political lessons
today from events that took place hundreds or
thousands of years ago.
Contemporary flows
of germplasm – not those of the Neolithic Age
or even the colonial era – reveal contemporary
interests and needs. This is why it is important
to examine modern germplasm
transfers and see what can be learned from them
and why it is important to construct legal
systems that address contemporary issues and
not those of a bygone age that no longer exists.
During the peak period of PGRFA collecting for
genebanks and scientific plant breeding programmes
(1972–1991), developing countries
received four times as many samples from
CGIAR centres as they provided. At first glance
this seems impossible, until you take into
account the high degree of genetic resource interdependence
among nations and the fact
that while a country might be rich in diversity
in two to five crops, it will likely be poor in
and needful of diversity in all the others.
Moreover, lack of functional storage facilities
has meant that many countries have had
to access and re-access materials repeatedly.
This is unfortunate in every respect, but
the fact remains that materials accessed the
second time may be just as needed and
valuable as they were the first time they were
accessed. Thus access and availability,
whether it is of a new accession or a sample
of the same accession for the second time,
is an indication of need, and a concrete benefit
to those on the receiving end.
By 1992, the four to one ratio had widened. For
every accession provided by developing
countries in 1992, those same countries received
60 samples. Today the ratio is certainly
better than 100 to one. Yes, I am making
a distinction between accessions and samples.
Accessions, in this regard, might be a single
landrace or farmer variety, whereas numerous
samples of that accession might be provided
by a genebank. The reality remains the
same, however: the flows of germplasm offer
concrete evidence of the value of genebank
collections, and of their value to developing
countries, i.e., to the original suppliers.
In the real world, this is not a zero-sum gain.
Countries contribute what they have to the global larder, and in an open-access system,
they get access to the diversity everyone else
has provided while retaining their own.
Thus, a country contributing rice germplasm to
the International Rice Research Institute has
access to the diversity contributed by 109 other
countries in addition to its own. This, in
essence, is how developing countries can be
both the major suppliers as well as the
beneficiaries of such a system of exchange.
To give you a sense of the scale of transfers:
in an average year, the CGIAR distributes some
70-100,000 samples. The United States
Department of Agriculture (USDA) distributes
about 30,000, and for the sake of comparison,
I’ll note that the Dutch genebank distributes
about 2,500 and the Nordic genebank
about 1,500.
Judging the value of genebank collections by
the sheer volume of distributions is not
wise. The “quality” of use – the ability of the
recipient to find, use and perhaps even conserve
the material received – affects the quantity
of samples requested. Few genebanks
distribute more than ten percent of their collection
in a year. In general, CGIAR genebanks
distribute more than others; and collections composed
predominantly of non-cereals distribute
a larger percentage of their total, in part
because their total is smaller.
Comparatively little goes to the private sector.
And, at least in the U.S., when the private
sector makes a request it does so for an average
of one third as many samples as others.
Interestingly, companies receiving PGRFA from
the U.S. are twice as likely to be from developing
countries as developed countries.
Modern Collections
The first collections were assembled for use,
not conservation. Refrigeration was available in
the 19th century, but not surprisingly, the
advent of genebanks awaited the use of Mendelian
techniques and the organisation of
scientific breeding programmes utilising PGFRA.
The U.S. government got medium-term storage
in the 1940s (only five to 10 percent of
160,000 accessions recorded as entering the
country since 1898 could be found, prompting
considerable consternation and a more serious
conservation effort. The U.S. and Russia
(then the USSR) each constructed long-term
facilities in the 1970s.
During the last three decades, the growth in the
number of genebanks and the size of the
collections they house has been remarkable. In
the mid-1970s there were only five to six
long-term facilities. By the mid-1980s there were
more than 50, containing more than twomillion accessions. Today there are more
than 75 such facilities containing more than five
million accessions. More than 135 countries
now have genebanks, though many (100 or
more) lack long-term storage capacity.
It is interesting, and sobering, to note that in
the early 1970s as genebanks and genebank
collections were being constructed, the vision
of the leading scientists of the day was for
a system of 50 base (major long-term) collections
associated with 60 active collections.
Something happened on the way to the (Roman)
forum. Today there are more than 1,300 collections,
the median size of which is 650 accessions.
Take the top ten percent of genebanks,
by size, and you are dealing with genebanks
holding more than 7,438 accessions.
A genebank with 7,438 accessions is a small
genebank, one whose collection could
probably be stored in fewer than ten home chest
freezers. Top 20 percent: 3,222 accessions;
top 25 percent: 2,325 accessions. It would be
difficult to argue that this is an efficient or
rational way to organise PGRFA conservation,
a point conceded by governments when
they adopted the FAO Global Plan of Action for
the Conservation and Sustainable Use of
PGRFA calling for the creation of a rational
system.
Many genebanks, particularly the smaller
ones, are not fulfilling their mandate, either to
provide materials for breeders, or to conserve
materials long-term. While approximately 75
countries have medium to long-term storage,
only 35 or so have what you might describe as
“secure” long-term storage, plus nine CGIAR
centres and four regional facilities. Even many
of these are not truly secure technically,
politically or financially.
Conditions in most genebanks simply do not
meet internationally accepted standards. Some
observers have described such genebanks as
genetic ghettos or morgues, and some are. Many
more, however, are hospices – facilities where
seeds go and wait to die. The deteriorating facilities
are, on one level, the inevitable result
of chronically low budgets. No genebank of
which I am aware has secure and formal
multi-year funding. But poor management and
sheer governmental neglect plays a role that
is rarely acknowledged.
It is also the case that many national genebanks
house crops for which there are no breeders
nationally, regionally or even sometimes globally!
At least five countries in addition to IITA
(International Institute of Tropical Agriculture,
Nigeria) have major yam collections, but
there may be as few as three yam breeders in the world, two at IITA, meaning that four countries
have collections, but no breeding programmes.
This is a typical phenomenon. I have
visited many, many genebanks housing
PGRFA of 50 to 100 or more crops only to discover
that the country had active breeding
work underway with fewer than ten crops, and
often fewer than five. It is little wonder that
the genebanks are both under-funded and deteriorating.
Many have undertaken to provide
a service for which there is little demand and no
constituency to provide political support.
From the breeder perspective, lack of information
is the greatest problem genebanks must
overcome. A 1988 article in Economic Botany
by two Cambridge University professors asserted
that the greatest need breeders had was for
the names and addresses of the collections! Information
systems have come a long way
since then. Breeders know where the genebanks
are. But there is still a serious lack of accession-
level evaluation data, which is what a breeder
really needs unless he/she is willing to
play a genetic lottery game and hope for the
best when requesting materials.
According to one 1984 study, the country from
which the accession had been collected or
acquired was the only information available for
accessions in most genebanks. Again, the
situation has improved, but is far from ideal.
Only 15 percent of Egypt’s and Zambia’s
collections have been characterised, meaning
that they have only the most basic of information
about 15 percent of their materials and
even less information for the remaining 85
percent. Colombia stands at 20 percent. Regarding
evaluation for one or more traits, the
percentages are hardly better: Iran five percent,
Egypt 15 percent, Bangladesh 23 percent,
and Mongolia 20 percent, for example. Without
good evaluation data, breeders cannot
easily find what they need. The genebank is
under-used. And finance ministries begin
to question why they should pay the large electricity
bills for museum collections.
The quality of storage provided by a genebank
can be quickly judged in most cases by
looking at the need for regeneration of
accessions. Over time, germination rates will
drop with all accessions stored in a genebank.
Periodically, therefore, seed must be taken
out and grown and new seed harvested
and placed in the genebank to keep up viability
rates. If a genebank has to regenerate its
accessions once every ten years, then it would
typically have a regeneration need of ten
percent at any time. Given the fact that cereals
constitute the bulk of PGRFA accessions
and that cereals can easily be stored for many decades in long-term facilities, one would
expect regeneration rates far below ten percent.
In reality, the countries themselves, in communications
with FAO, report a mean regeneration
need of 50 percent. Some 95 percent
of countries report a need of greater than ten
percent, translating into the necessity to regenerate
approximately one million accessions
if the material is to be saved. This does
not speak well for the safety of the collections.
The picture is likewise bleak when we look at
systems of “safety duplication.” For safety
purposes, genebanks will often make provisions
to store a “back-up” of their collection at
another facility. In the mid-1990s, about 75
countries reported to FAO on this subject,
but only 11 claimed that they had fully duplicated
their collections, which totalled
400,000 accessions.
This foregoing gives a hint about possible
future genebank priorities. In the bullet-point
list below I have identified some of these
priorities and added a few which I think are
important but which I will not have an opportunity
to address in this lecture:
- Strengthening information about the accessions
and to identify materials useful in addressing
biotic and abiotic stresses such as drought
- Increased use of functional genomics
- Prebreeding to enhance the utility of the collections
for breeders
- Use of genebanks to supply materials for
in situ projects and to restore germplasm, as
appropriate, following loss through natural
disasters, war, civil strife, etc.
- Work to support the unique needs of urban
agriculture
- Increased attention to vegetables and minor
crops
In addition, we must keep in mind that collections
are also used for basic scientific research,
not just for breeding. More than a fifth
of articles in Crop Science, Euphytica, Plant
Breeding, and Theoretical & Applied Genetics,
are based on genetic materials acquired
from genebanks.
While the picture I have painted of global conservation
efforts is not particularly pretty, it
must be recognised that in the 1960s and 1970s
collections were assembled under emergency/
crisis conditions.
It is understandable that
the “System” was not completely thought
through, or planned in detail. We owe the early
pioneers of the PGRFA world a great deal.
Compared to their efforts, our own can look
quite meagre. It is also important to realise
that serious problems beset most genebanks, a
relatively small number of facilities operateat a high level and meet international standards.
The world literally depends on these genebanks
– those of the CGIAR, plus a modest number
of national facilities (in both developed
and developing countries) as well as several
regional genebanks.
In Situ
I have not mentioned the role of in situ conservation
and propose not to do so now in any
detail. However, one observation may be
instructive: If, as many people assert, there has
been a great deal of genetic erosion and if
genetic erosion continues at a high rate today,
and if a high percentage of the genepool of
the major crops has already been collected (as
several independent studies over some years
seem to indicate), and if there are no tools for
identifying exactly where specific materials
are located in situ and no mechanism for easily
accessing it, then it stands to reason that
we must concentrate our attention on genebanks
and ex situ collections if our concern is with
access and availability.
In situ is a source of planting materials for
farmers at the local or community level. It was
the source of today’s genebank collections,
of course. But collecting is on the decline. And
in situ is not at the moment a major source
of germplasm for breeding or research programmes
or even for farmers in other locales.
Promotion of in situ or on-farm management
of PGRFA is important, especially for the
millions of farm families that are largely selfprovisioning
in terms of seeds. But, as no
sizeable, coordinated systems of in situ collections
exist, the subject falls largely outside
the remit of this lecture.
The growth in the number of genebank collections
and what is in them is a testament to
the free exchange of PGRFA that existed from
the early 1970s when the collections began
to be assembled, up until the early 1990s. Some
think of that “exchange” and indeed all exchanges
going back to the colonial era as “biopiracy,”
but without it the world would be
different in three important ways today:
1.Few countries and no international centres
would have meaningful PGRFA collections;
2.Much of the material now in genebanks would
be extinct. Genetic erosion would have taken
care of it, in situ. Indeed, a great deal of the
diversity found in the fields would not be
there, because genebanks have been used to restore
diversity lost in the fields of more
than 40 countries by CGIAR since 1981; and,
3.There would have been no Charles Darwin
or Nikolai Vavilov, no Jack Harlan, no Norman
Borlaug, etcThis prompts the posing of the counter-factual:
Would anyone be better off today if crops
had stayed in their regions of origin? At what
point, or on the basis of what criteria, should
transfers have ceased – at what point and under
what circumstances would it have made
sense to close the door on germplasm exchange?
Would anyone be better off today had PGRFA
been closely regulated and sold as a commodity
from 1492 onwards? True, the “rich”
countries would have paid for their access to the
diversity of Asia, Africa, and Latin America.
But African countries, many of which have a
food system based on maize, a crop of the
Americas, would have paid dearly too. Asia
would have paid for its wheat, Latin America
for its soybeans and bananas. The list goes
on. Would there have been any winners?
Or would everyone have become a loser?
Access
The new International Treaty on Plant Genetic
Resources for Food and Agriculture removes
most access barriers, at least for materials included
in the Treaty’s Multilateral System
that are held by Parties to the Treaty.
Unfortunately, most minor crops are not covered
and it will be impossible to assemble working
collections and begin breeding of these, unless
you already have the collection. Moreover,
most of the absolute germplasm embargoes
in the past have involved crops not covered
by the new Treaty, though in recent years
access to almost everything has become difficult.
Nevertheless, the Treaty is a gigantic breakthrough
that covers most of the world’s ex situ
PGFRA accessions. The Treaty, however,
mainly takes care of the “access” question that
we began the lecture with; it does not ensure
“availability.” This is where the newly-created
Global Crop Diversity Trust, an endowment
fund aimed at securing the future of collections,
enters the picture in support of the objectives
of the Treaty as well as the FAO Global Plan of
Action.
The Treaty and the Trust provide a historically
unprecedented opportunity: politically-guaranteed
access (and benefit sharing) plus assured
conservation and availability. Developing
countries can use this combination and seize the
opportunity to rationalise their systems and
place more attention on active collections/breeding,
thus improving efficiency and productivity
while lowering the cost of their agricultural
research programmes.
The crucial link between the Treaty and the
Trust must be protected. Both entities are fragile
and both will be subjected to short-term,
opportunistic political pressures. And this is
where we must keep in mind the second
point raised at the beginning of this lecture –
an appreciation for the nature of and the
location of “value” in PGRFA. Its value is not
as a commodity. As much as it may be the
most useful and essential resource on earth,
PGRFA is still not a resource having the
same characteristics or commercial potential as
gold or some other commodity. For both
historical and biological reasons – as well as
because of the dependence that all nations
have on crops of foreign origin – PGRFA is a
poor commodity and an inappropriate subject
for geopolitical games.
These resources cannot and should not be used
as a political football or seen as a potential
mechanism for redressing past grievances. They
cannot figure into a strategy for building a
new international economic order. They cannot
and need not even be used as pressure for
building equal (and unnecessary) capacity for
their conservation and use in every country.
But they can be safely conserved. Access can be
facilitated. Benefits can be generated and
then shared. And food security can be enhanced.
All of these things can happen if the international
community accepts its responsibilities
and if we seize the opportunity provided
by the combination of the Treaty and the Trust.
These should be our aims in working in the
field of PGRFA. Expecting much more would be
unrealistic and unwise.
Putting it all together
“The grand objective of the International Bureau
of Plant Genetic Resources should remain
the development of a worldwide genetic resource
conservation network devoted to the needs of
world agriculture”
IBPGR, 1986, now International Plant Genetics
Resources Institute
This simple objective is not a bad place to
start. If we start here, we will need to identify
priorities – priority genebanks and priority
collections. And we will need to focus on these.
We will have to understand that our task is
to secure diversity, not genebanks. Neither the
Treaty nor the Trust can become a welfare
system for genebanks. A “politically-correct”
system of genebanks is not sustainable and
not workable. Fortunately, it is also not needed.
A sound scientific system for conserving
PGRFA married with a robust legal agreement
to ensure access and benefit-sharing is all
we need – and this is precisely what we now
have within our grasp.
I would insert one additional thought: In the
post “9/11” world, we have all come to understand
that “safety” is always relative. Nothing,
it seems, is completely safe. The unthinkable has
happened more than once. More unthinkable
events probably lie ahead. To genebanks and
PGRFA collections, it makes little difference
whether we term something as an attack or as
a defensive or retaliatory action. A bomb is
a bomb. Will genebanks ever become involved
either as targets or innocent bystanders?
The time has come to consider and plan for the
worst. Countries may wish to re-visit an offer
once made by Norway to construct and house
collections at a secure and remote location
in the permafrost on the far-north island of Svalbard
(Spitzbergen).
If a
collection housed there were ever destroyed, it
might turn out to be the least of our problems.
We face today the same basic challenge faced
by the early pioneers – Frankel, Harlan, Hawkes,
Bennett, Chang, Ochoa, Williams and others:
How to build a workable system that serves
world agriculture. We know that it will take
strong political will. It will also take equally
strong and independent scientific integrity
and skill. Without the latter, and without a sound
scientific plan, all the political declarations,
demands and agreements will amount to little.
The tools – the Treaty and the Trust – are
now in place. Let us hope we have the good
sense to use them wisely. And quickly.
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