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Several ways of transferring the benefits to 'Kani' tribe was
discussed. Kani tribe, being an unorganized nomadic tribe has
no institutional arrangement nor they were equipped to receive
such benefits. The author felt it is not proper to give the benefits
only to the informers and wanted that it should benefit the whole
Kani tribe who collectively hold this information. Suggestion
to transfer the money to the State Tribal Welfare Department was
mooted by many. But it was not taken up as it was found that in
that way the real benefit will never reach them. The idea of the
trust fund for the Kani tribe was originated from a very useful
and protracted discussion the author had with Prof. Anil K. Gupta,
the founder and co-ordinator of SRISTI and the Honey Bee Network,
Ahmedabad.
The
tribals finally a registered trust, with about 60% of the Kani
families of Kerala becoming members of the trust, with support
from TBGRI, local Government officials and NGOs. Services rendered
by Mr. Pradeep, a free hand journalist and active social worker
engaged in the upliftment of tribals need special mention. He
was instrumental in drafting the constitution for the Kani welfare
trust with the help of some legal experts. The author and his
colleague, Dr. Rajasekharan extended logical support and financial
assistance required for registering the trust and for starting
an office. They have also engaged them (the two Kani informers)
in TBGRI on a temporary basis which gave them some stable income.
In March 1999, the amount due to the Kanis at that time (Rs. 5,35,000/-
approx.) was transferred to this trust with the understanding
that only the interest accruing from this amount will be used
for the welfare activities of the Kani tribe. The author and his
team thus demonstrated that indigenous knowledge system merit
support, recognition and fair and adequate compensation. This
benefit sharing model is now acclaimed as the first of its kind,
which implemented , in letter and spirit the Article 8(j) &
10 (c ) of the Convention on Biological Diviersity (CBD), and
is now recognized as the 'Kani Model' or 'Pushpangadan's Model'.
'Jeevani'
was able to capture the market in India as well as abroad, including
countries like USA and Japan. This necessitated a regular supply
of fresh leaves of Trichopus zeylanicus. Since the wild collection
may not be dependable, TBGRI scientists developed a protocol for
cultivating this plant. Cultivation studies revealed that the
plant is habitat-specific and that the therapeutically active
principles are produced only when it is cultivated in and around
its natural habitat. TBGRI, however trained 25 families to cultivate
this plant around their dwellings in the forest. In the first
year itself each family earned about Rs. 8000 on sale of the leaves
from cultivation of Trichopus zeylanicus from a half-acre
plot maintained by each family.
Unfortunately,
however, the Forest Department objected to the cultivation, with
the plea that the tribals might remove the plants from the natural
population of the species in the forest and make it endangered.
The argument against this was that even if the tribals collect
it from the forest, it will possibly be a sustainable one as only
leaves are required for the drug manufacture and the plant is
a perennial one. But, the Forest Department came up with another
objection that this plant is not in the official list of the plants/plant
materials permitted to be collected by Kani Tribe, in the first
place. In the meantime TBGRI developed fast multiplication by
both vegetative and tissue culture methods to produce large scale
planting materials to be supplied to the tribals. The issue was
finally resolved after a long period of uncertainty. The Kerala
Government very recently decided to permit the tribals to cultivate
this plant. It is hoped that a large number of Kani families will
be highly benefited from the cultivation of this plant, and now
the tribals are directly negotiating with the pharmaceutical company
for the sale of its leaves. It may be mentioned here that the
TBGRI-Kani benefit sharing experiment was evolved much before
the signing of CBD. The whole effort was based on a mutual trust
and benefit between the Kanis and TBGRI. The ratification of CBD
by Government of India in February 1994, however helped in implementing
the benefit sharing with the Kanis.
Lesson
from the Kani Experiment
Traditional
societies all over the world have rich ethnobiological knowledge,
that particularly linked to the biological resources around them.
Identifying themselves as a part of the ecosystem and
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