E-grāmata: Crop Genetic Resources as a Global Commons: Challenges in International Law and Governance [Taylor & Francis e-book]

This collection of 19 essays brings together economic and agronomic research on collective pooling and management of plant genetic materials for food and agriculture (PGRFA). They consider how corporate "hyperownership" and free-trade agreements undermines the mutual benefits of PGRFA pooling. They look at different international legal supports for PGRFA pooling, addressing design issues in the multilateral system created by the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (ITPGRFA). The essays are organized into three sections that overview countries' interdependence on plant genetic resources and the imperative of international cooperation, the history and design of the ITPGRFA, and critical reflections on the Treaty, how it could be different, and other ways of institutionalizing global genetic resources as a commons. The contributors are from around the world, but mostly Europe, and include agronomics professors, researchers, and food security advocates. Earthscan is an imprint of Taylor & Francis Group. Annotation ©2013 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Farmers have engaged in collective systems of conservation and innovation – improving crops and sharing their reproductive materials – since the earliest plant domestications. Relatively open flows of plant germplasm attended the early spread of agriculture; they continued in the wake of (and were driven by) imperialism, colonization, emigration, trade, development assistance and climate change. As crops have moved around the world, and agricultural innovation and production systems have expanded, so too has the scope and coverage of pools of shared plant genetic resources that support those systems. The range of actors involved in their conservation and use has also increased dramatically.

This book addresses how the collective pooling and management of shared plant genetic resources for food and agriculture can be supported through laws regulating access to genetic resources and the sharing of benefits arising from their use. Since the most important recent development in the field has been the creation of the multilateral system of access and benefit-sharing under the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture, many of the chapters in this book will focus on the architecture and functioning of that system. The book analyzes tensions that are threatening to undermine the potential of access and benefit-sharing laws to support the collective pooling of plant genetic resources, and identifies opportunities to address those tensions in ways that could increase the scope, utility and sustainability of the global crop commons.