Medicines and cosmetics use substances derived from nature. But Bioprospecting can turn into biopiracy. More and more companies are patenting natural ingredients making billions. It can come at a cost to the environment and traditional communities living in biodiversity-rich regions.

Credits:
Reporter: Louise Osborne
Video Editor: David Jacobi
Supervising Editor: Joanna Gottschalk

We're destroying our environment at an alarming rate. But it doesn't need to be this way. Our new channel Planet A explores the shift towards an eco-friendly world — and challenges our ideas about what dealing with climate change means. We look at the big and the small: What we can do and how the system needs to change. Every Friday we'll take a truly global look at how to get us out of this mess.

#PlanetA #Biopiracy #Colonialism

Read more:
European Patent Office accepts biopiracy argument and revokes patent: https://cordis.europa.eu/article/id/2...

World Intellectual Property Organization: Leveraging economic growth through benefit sharing: https://www.wipo.int/ipadvantage/en/d...

The Nagoya Protocol on access and benefit sharing: https://www.cbd.int/abs/

Corporate control and global governance of marine genetic resources: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/s...

Traditional Knowledge Digital Library: http://www.tkdl.res.in/tkdl/langdefau...

Chapters
00:00 Introduction
00:45 How It Began
02:28 Patently Questionable
05:25 Exploitation of Nature
07:12 Ethical Biotrade
08:38 Taking to the High Seas
10:50 The Road Ahead