This chapter argues that Rawlsian social justice fails to ensure property rights for Indigenous people in the Bangladesh context. Explaining from an Indigenous standpoint paradigm (IRP) in bioprospecting (commercial use of plant materials) research among the Rakhain community, the authors conclude that non-Western utilitarian justice rather Ihsan (good deed for good deed, good acts for good acts) is a probable solution for minimizing the majority-minority tensions, establishing the rights of marginal people, and reaching SDGs in subsequent decades. Despite a rural, remote, and minority context, the appeal remains global as the bioprospecting is neither a national nor regional but a historical and global phenomenon and needs immediate policy, either attention or action or both.
TopThe Concept Of Bioprospecting, Traditional Knowledge In Relevant International Conventions
At least two UN bodies and international agreements currently deal with traditional knowledge. The first is the UNEP’s “Convention on Biological Diversity” (UNEP). This is a 1992 environmental treaty that went into effect at the end of 1993. Proposal 1: Protect and share benefits of traditional knowledge (Siebenhuner et al., 2005); second, the WIPO and its treaties. The traditional interdependence relationship should fairly share the advantages gained from traditional knowledge, inventions, and practises linked to the use and preservation of biological resources and the ongoing use of their components. To conserve and utilise biodiversity sustainably, indigenous and local groups that reflect traditional lifestyles are required to respect and preserve their knowledge, inventions, and practises, as far as feasible and suitable. Encourage equitable sharing of the advantages gained from the use of such knowledge, innovation, and practise with the owners of such knowledge, innovation, and practise. According to the CBD, traditional knowledge is limited to the preservation and sustainable use of biological variety (Oguamanam, 2020; Van Lenteren, 2021). Promote knowledge, innovation, and practise. CBD also connects traditional knowledge with indigenous and local communities (ILC), implying that these groups generate and sustain traditional knowledge. Long-held knowledge, experience, invention, or practise of actual or prospective value handed down from generation to generation. Traditional knowledge is acquired via long-term experience, according to CBD. It arrived and adapted to the local knowledge, invention, and practise. It is jointly held and may be handed down verbally, although it is mostly oral. Stories, songs, tales, and other forms of expression exist alongside written records. Proverbs, indigenous languages, cultural values, beliefs, traditions, etc. Traditional knowledge covers farming techniques, crop types, animal breeds, and more. Traditional knowledge is a science, particularly in agriculture and fisheries. Aesthetics, horticulture, and forestry (Cicka & Quave, 2019) Traditional knowledge is seen as a resource by the CBD, especially in relation to biological and genetic resources. Local communities have developed distinctive knowledge, techniques, technologies, and practical sciences by creating and using local biological and genetic resources. Technologies and experimental sciences often complement biological and genetic resources. Separate and complimentary. Thus, CBD seeks to preserve biological and genetic resources, as well as traditional knowledge. Assure equitable benefit sharing of biological resources and traditional knowledge (Van Lenteren, 2021; Lawson, Rourke, & Humphries, 2020).