[Commons-Law] FWD: CAMBIA Pushes for Open Source BioTech

[Soenke Zehle]

[via BIO-IPR]
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TITLE: Push to free up biotech tools for all
AUTHOR: Anna Salleh
PUBLICATION: ABC Science Online
DATE: 1 December 2003
SOURCE: Australian Broadcasting Corporation
URL: http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/stories/s999733.htm
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ABC Science Online | 1 December  2003

PUSH TO FREE UP BIOTECH TOOLS FOR ALL

Anna Salleh

Scientists anywhere in the world, including developing nations, should have
free access to the scientific tools of modern biology and genetics, says an
Australian geneticist.

Dr Richard Jefferson, founder of the non-profit organisation CAMBIA based in
Canberra, is urging the global biotechnology community to support a new
program to promote this "open access".

The new program is called Biological Innovation for Open Society (BIOS) and
Jefferson will announce it at the World Economic Forum to be held in Davos,
Switzerland next January.

Jefferson said the tools of innovation were being withheld from the public
and from innovators themselves, stifling competition, fair play and
creativity.

"For example, access to the fundamental tool used to transfer a gene into a
plant, Agrobacterium transformation, is controlled by a handful of large
companies," he said.

Jefferson called for a "democratisation of innovation" based on "open source
genetics". Central to this concept was a distinction between the tools of
innovation and the products of innovation.

Tools of genetics and modern biology should be made freely available just as
computer programming tools were shared in the open source software movement,
he said.

"CAMBIA is developing an alternative technology that's equally as effective
[as the Agrobacterium transformation] but will be made available to anyone
who wants it."

Another technology, developed by colleague Dr Andrzej Kilianm, called DarT,
was a powerful gene mapping technology already being made available under
the open access regime, said Jefferson.

"The open source revolution in information technology has proven itself rock
solid as one of the greatest innovations in the history of creativity. If
you decentralise the group of tool creators and make sure people are bound
to a public good ethos, it works and makes money for people," he said.

"With Linux and all the open source innovations, you're not seeing the death
of Microsoft, you're seeing Microsoft work harder to be a better company so
that it can stay afloat."

The scientific tools under BIOS would be licensed under a similar agreement
as the general public licence of the Linux computing community, Jefferson
said.

"That licence will say you will agree to share improvements in the core
technology. You can make your own applications as proprietary as you want;
you can patent your invention. But the tools to do that must be a public
good."

He said the current domination of biotechnology innovation by "large
monolithic corporations with high capital" was not serving the public at
large, including developing nations, and had led to a "legitimate unease by
the public about biotech".

"I don't think that multinationals are necessarily evil, but I do think they
have to be complemented by alternative technologies," he said.

"Biotechnology, the way it is right now, is needed in the developing world
like a screen door on a submarine," said Jefferson. "What it really needs is
what good science can do in biology, in biotechnology. And that means a
different agenda and a different group of innovators.

"We'd like to use the tools of modern genetics, some of which will be
molecular markers, some of which might be transgenic, to improve the
spectrum of what we can offer as a tool."

He added such tools could also help us understand and improve agricultural
management systems such as organic approaches. An example of this would be
the development of new "bioindicator" plant varieties that would tell
farmers about their soil nitrogen levels.

But most importantly, BIOS would offer a choice to farmers at the local
level: "We have a 3D philosophy: democratise, decentralise and diversify,"
he said.

CAMBIA's main funding comes from technology licensing and the Rockefeller
Foundation in the U.S.

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GOING FURTHER (compiled by GRAIN)


Speaking of patents on Agrobacterium, the agrochemical giant Bayer has just
won a monopoly on the use of A. tumefsciens in developing transgenic plants
in Europe:

Angela Cullen, "Bayer Gets Exclusive Rights To Plant-Parasite Patent", Dow
Jones Newswire, Monheim, 28 November 2003.
http://www.e-topics.com/index.asp?layout=topic_story&UserID=20011105033636055798&topic=830&doc_id=d1127018.7jo&date=11%2F28%2F2003&display=Intellectual+Property

Bayer CropScience, "Following grant of European patent on Agrobacterium
transformation of plants, Bayer CropScience AG and Max Planck Society
announce new licensing deal", Bayer press release, Monheim/Munich, 27
November 2003.
http://www.press.bayer.com/News/News.nsf/id/1AD9DC6F48E0A659C1256DEB003EBEBF?Open&ccm=010005000&l=EN

Rachel Melcer, "Monsanto downplays European patent ruling", St Louis
Post-Dispatch, 2 December 2003.
http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/business/stories.nsf/Business/AA4CF9D74742705E86256DF1001EB1A0?OpenDocument&Headline=Monsanto+downplays+European+patent+ruling


For more information on CAMBIA's "open source genetics" programme:
http://www.cambia.org.au/main/opensource.htm