5.32. The representative of Bangladesh said that his delegation did not support patenting of life forms like plants and animals as per its domestic laws and also on moral and ethical grounds. States were sovereign, and traditional knowledge and genetic resources belonged to either indigenous people or to the states. Safeguarding genetic resources and traditional knowledge and folklore was imperative to protect them from being misappropriated in the form of patents of non original innovations, which had been a matter of great concern for developing countries. Genetic resources and traditional knowledge could be protected by effective disclosure mechanisms and by obtaining prior informed consent. The TRIPS-CBD issue had been a critical implementation issue for all the developing countries and especially LDCs. Both the TRIPS Agreement and the CBD and the Nagoya Protocol broadly upheld the use of innovation for the development of the people and those agreements should be complementary to each other. The CBD had provided for establishment of legitimate rights over genetic resources, and it was only moral that patent applicants would disclose the source of inventions if they accessed and used a particular genetic resource of which they were not the rightful owners. The disclosure requirement was also consistent with the transparency principle established in the multilateral trading system and would help reduce the number of erroneous patents and biopiracy. The disclosure requirement would also ensure the access to benefit sharing to the rightful owners of the resources. He said that the mandate provided for in paragraph 19 of the Doha Declaration and reinforced in the subsequent Ministerial Declarations should be implemented in an early and constructive manner.
