Good Food is First Food. It is not junk food. It is the food that connects nature and nutrition with livelihoods. This food is good for our health; it comes from the rich biodiversity of our regions; it provides employment to people. Most importantly, cooking and eating give us pleasure. …
This manual provides the materials needed to deliver a basic training in access and benefit sharing (ABS) of genetic resources and associated traditional knowledge as provided for under the Convention on Biological Diversity. The background, key components and procedures, and obligations, rights, and responsibilities of the different actors involved are …
Political boundaries do not limit the movement of biological resources and knowledge. Countries in the Himalayan region share common biological resources and traditional knowledge, and protection and sustainable use cannot be planned effectively by single countries in isolation. The unsustainable exploitation of wild flora and fauna is continuing through cross-border …
Traditional farming systems and conservation of local cultivars and associated indigenous knowledge are under threat and growing pressure resulting in genetic erosion of crop diversity. These systems are an essential component of sustainable crop production, household income and human nutrition for many of the poor farmers found in fragile semiarid …
The United Nation's ninth meeting of the Conference of the Parties (cop 9) to the Convention on Biological Diversity (cbd) was recently held in Bonn, Germany. Amidst contentions relating to bio-fuels and abs (Access and Benefit Sharing), Meena Gupta, secretary, ministry for environment and forests, finds time to give an …
This paper aims to assist the international community in its efforts to curb the misappropriation of genetic resources and associated traditional knowledge through IPRs. It outlines how an international legal regime may assist the enforcement of decisions made under national access and benefit-sharing regulations by providing for the recognition of …
Australia's unique duck-billed platypus -- an egg-laying, furry animal with web feet that spends most of its time underwater -- is in fact part bird, part reptile and part mammal according to its gene map. A team of international scientists released the platypus genome on Thursday, saying its complex sequence …
Scientists have found important genetic differences between people that may help explain why some smokers get lung cancer and others do not. Three teams from France, Iceland and the United States said on Wednesday that they had pinpointed a region of the genome containing genes that can put smokers at …
San Diego: Dr John Kelsoe has spent his career trying to identify the biological roots of bipolar disorder. In December, he announced he had discovered several gene mutations closely tied to the disease, also known as manic depression. Then Kelsoe, a prominent psychiatric geneticist at the University of California, San …
A genetic circuit in HIV that decides whether it switches on or stays dormant could hold the key to anti-HIV therapy, according to a new study. As part of the study, researchers at the University of California have in fact been able to "switch off' the circuit, driving HIV to …
All the countries in the Hindu Kush-Himalayas are party to the CBD. However, only a few of them have ABS policies and laws, and these are at different stages of implementation. Central to the delay is a lack of awareness and understanding of ABS and the key components of an …
Over-use of high-yielding breeds of farm animals is affecting the indigenous livestock. The State of the World's Animal Genetic Resources report by the FAO warns this trend weakens genetic diversity and can affect global food supply. Around 20 per cent of indigenous breeds are classified as at risk. During the …
Even as actor Salman Khan's brief stint at the t Jodhpur jail hogged the headlines, scientists at the Hyderabad-based Laboratory for the Conservation of Endangered Species (LacoNEs) held a quite celebration. Their experiment in artificially inseminating a black buck had proved to be a success. Blacky, as the fawn was …
This report gives an overview of current research regarding the full range of possible effects of transgene flow on human health, the environment, the various stakeholders in the food and feed production chain and on the in situ and ex situ conservation of plant genetic resources for food and agriculture. …
Lukewarm spots >> Biodiversity hotspots are regions of significant diversity threatened with destruction through commercial exploitation. There are 34 hotspots in the world, accounting for just 1.4 per cent of the world's land. These regions support 60 per cent of species on earth. A hotspot contains at least 1,500 species …
Access to food involves entitlements for producing or acquiring food, which are discussed in this paper under three main headings: access to productive natural resources including land, water, agroforestry, biodiversity, seeds and other genetic resources, and environmental services; access to diverse types of knowledge, including traditional and indigenous knowledge, current …
It is one of the mysteries of gene regulation. The male of a species has one X-chromosome, the females two. So it would seem that female cells would produce twice as much proteins encoded by X-chromosome as males. But this does not happen. The cells resolve the problem by either …
oxygen depletion in oceans, caused mainly by agricultural run-off and pollution, creates dead zones where sea creatures can suffocate. A recent study claims that dead zones can also lead to male-dominated fish population, which can drive a species to extinction. Researchers from the City University of Hong Kong raised zebra …
