Associated traditional knowledge, big data and the innovation train

Originally published on LinkedIn in October 2017 (but still important)

Without scientists, the only thing you can get out of a forest are the trees.

At the next the Biodiversity COP in 2018 in Egypt, Brazil should take a position on a topic that has sparked controversy in 2016: How to ensure benefit sharing from access to associated traditional knowledge (ATK) when biodiversity information is in digital format after DNA sequencing?

DNA is a big chain made from 4 types of blocks, the chemical compounds adenosine, thymine, guanine and cytosine, represented by letters ACTG. The human genome has over 3 billion of these ‘blocks’ which, side by side, encode all living beings. With the evolution of DNA sequencing technology over the last 10 years, the cost to sequence a genome has fallen from one hundred million to a thousand dollars. Soon, we will sequence the DNA of everything!

Biodiversity ‘supplier’ countries, such as Namibia, want greater control over Digital Sequence Information (DSI) to ensure benefit sharing of synthetic biology products, in which biotechnology is made with artificially produced DNA. ‘Consumer’ countries, such as Canada, argue that synthetic biology is made from digital not biological information and therefore should be exempt. A point of view, if I may say, that has no support in the scientific literature or community. Brazil, owner of the largest biodiversity in the world and at the same time a major exporter of food produced by nonnative species, is in the position of both supplier and consumer, and could help reach a consensus.

The benefit sharing is a type of tax to be paid to native populations for the use of associated traditional knowledge, which is a type of intellectual property. It was one of the great achievements of the Conference  of Biological Diversity (CBD), signed by more than 150 countries in Rio de Janeiro in 1992. It should ensure not only remuneration for the use of this intellectual property, foster new sustainable businesses as well as reduce overall deforestation and pollution levels.

Brazil was and is in the forefront of biodiversity access, with legislation that can serve as model for countries that still need to create their own. But attending to the COP14 preparatory meeting, organized recently by Brazilian National Industry Federation (CNI), I came to the conclusion that our law, even though vanguard, is late.

For centuries, researchers sought more than inspiration in the traditional knowledge of indigenous peoples from biodiversity rich countries. They literally stole plants, animals and stories, without ever sharing the benefits of their discoveries and inventions. The law was designed to prevent this. But the way to do the science that generates innovation has changed. Today, observation of patterns that emerge from the analysis of large volumes of data (big data), with the help of artificial intelligence, are the main way to ask new questions. Only highly trained scientists are able to produce, competitively, novelty and innovation. And Brazil has less than half the world average number scientists (450 against a 1000 per 1 million inhabitants).