(08/03/05) Magda Aelvoet (Groen!) wint eerste proces tegen biopiraterij ooit - Europees Octrooibureau weigert VS patent voor schimmelwerende olie

• 2005-03-08

EPO upholds decision to withdraw 'free tree' patent: Greens celebrate Neem biopiracy victory

Daniel Cohn-Bendit and Monica Frassoni, Co-Presidents of the Greens/EFA Group, welcomed the European Patent Office's historic decision today to definitively uphold the revocation of a patent on the Indian neem tree, thus dealing a killer blow to biopiracy in Europe and around the world.

"We congratulate our former Green President Magda Aelvoet on her important victory today and thank her, and her fellow plaintiffs, for their decade long struggle against biopiracy."

Former Belgian health minister and Minister of State Magda Aelvoet, was President of the Green Group in the European Parliament when the original submission to the EPO to cancel the patent was made on 14 June 1995. She represented the European Greens in Munich today. Speaking after the decision, Aelvoet said:

"Our victory against biopiracy is threefold. First, it is a victory for traditional knowledge and practices. This is the first time anybody has been able to have a patent rejected on these grounds. Second, it is a victory for solidarity; with the people of developing countries – who have definitively earned the sovereign rights to their natural resources, and with our colleagues in the NGOs who fought with us against this patent for the last ten years. And third, coming as it does on International Women's Day, this is also a victory for women. The three people who successfully argued this case against the might of the American administration and its corporate allies, were women; Vandana Shiva, Linda Bullard and myself."

At a meeting in Munich the EPO rejected a challenge made in 2001 by the United States Ministry of Agriculture (USDA) and the chemicals multinational WR Grace to the office's previous decision to cancel their patent on the fungicidal properties of seeds extracted from the neem tree. The EPO originally issued the patent on 14 September 1994, before withdrawing it under pressure from the Green Group in the European Parliament and two NGOs on 10 May 2000. Today's decision brings to an end the ten year legal process.

The EPO definitely accepted the arguments from the Greens, the Research Foundation for Science, Technology, and Natural Resource Policy (India), and the International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements (Germany) that the patent was unacceptable as it had no particular innovative or inventive qualities.

Biological piracy, or biopiracy, is the process of patenting living resources or traditional knowledge and practices from predominantly developing countries and applying intellectual property restrictions on their use – to the exclusive profit of rich developed companies or countries. The Persian name for the neem trea is Azad-Darakth or the 'free tree'. The Indian people have for millennia used this tree in agriculture, public health, medicine, toiletries, cosmetics and livestock protection.