THE Pacific island nation of Samoa last week became the first state to assert sovereignty over an as-yet-undiscovered gene of a native plant. Samoa hopes this will force any company that exploits the gene to reward the indigenous people for their resources and knowledge.
The gene in question makes the protein prostratin, found in the bark of the Samoan mamala tree, Homalanthus nutans. Prostratin is used to combat HIV by flushing the virus from its hiding place in immune cells so it can be killed with standard antiviral drugs.
Last week Samoa signed an agreement to identify the gene with the University of California, Berkeley, where researchers hope to isolate it and transfer the gene into bacteria. This will allow prostratin to be produced in bulk.
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The University of California will split revenues from potential prostratin-based drugs equally with Samoa. Both sides will benefit, says Paul Cox, an ethnobiologist at the US National Tropical Botanical Garden in Hawaii, who was alerted to prostratin by traditional healers in Samoa. 鈥淚f they hadn鈥檛 pointed it out to us, we wouldn鈥檛 have found it,鈥� he says. Samoa鈥檚 share will be split between the government, the villages where the mamala trees grow and the traditional healers who told Cox about prostratin.
Berkeley scientists will label every test tube containing the gene or its product as sovereign Samoan soil. Although the mamala tree grows on other Pacific islands, Samoan healers were the first to recognise the medicinal potential of the bark extract, and that鈥檚 what gives Samoa the right to declare it as sovereign. 鈥淭heir indigenous knowledge is effectively equivalent to planting a flag,鈥� Cox says.
Samoa鈥檚 move is the boldest attempt yet to secure for indigenous knowledge the kind of legal status known as 鈥減rior art鈥� that is enjoyed by pre-existing inventions 鈥� which will prevent others from patenting it. 鈥淚t shows that what is taken as a definition of prior art is evolving,鈥� says Sandy Thomas of the UK鈥檚 Nuffield Council on Bioethics. Thomas was a member of a commission which, in 2002, called for the patent system to recognise indigenous knowledge as prior art.