The document discusses patenting trends and challenges related to marine biodiversity, highlighting its significance for sustainable development and the legal frameworks governing it in India and globally. It presents statistics on marine species, patent applications, and the exploitation of marine genetic resources, along with recommendations for stronger international and national conservation laws. The authors emphasize the urgent need for policies that protect marine ecosystems to prevent biodiversity loss.

1. “Patenting Trends in
Marine Biodiversity-
Issues & Challenges”
BY
Deepak Debnath,
Saravanan. A,
LL.M-II(IPR),
SLS-PUNE

2. Scheme of the Presentation:
 Statistics of Marine Biodiversity (MBD):
 Global & India
 Patenting trends in Marine Biodiversity
 Statistics of Marine Patents
 Recent Developments
 Legal framework to conserve MBD
 Global & India
 Recommendations

3. Introduction:
 Human civilization and Biodiversity exploitation
 70% of earth contribution-Ocean & Seas
 Marine Biodiversity (MBD)-Sustainable Development

4. Global Marine Biodiversity (MBD):
 Definition:
 App 3,00,000-Described Marine Species
 Two biggest repositories-Coral reef and Deep Sea
India’s Contribution:
 One of 17 mega Biodiverse countries
 25-hotspots
 Only country in Asia – long record inventories of
coastal and marine Biodiversity

5. Statistics of MBD in India:
 Coastline- 7517 km; 5423 km (Mainland) & 2094 km
(Islands)
Survey taken by ZSI in 2005:
 Only 2/3 of marine habitat is covered till today
1) Marine Algae:
 844-Species, 217-Genera, Rhidophyta-434 species
 Uses-Agar, Liquid Fertilizer, Commercial Farming

6. Cont…
2) Sponges: 486 species
3) Arthropoda Crustacea:
 1,50,000 (Globally) of which 40,000 have been
described so far
4) Coral Reef Biodiversity:
 Globally: Unknown (App ranges from 600,000 to 9
million)
 Highest-Indo Pacific, Lowest- Eastern Pacific
 India: 218 species (60 genera and 15 families)
 Four major Reef Areas

7. Patenting Trends in Marine Biodiversity
(MBD):
 Use of MBD to human- Ancient times (4000 yrs ago)
 China, Japan, Taiwan and India
 MBD Ecosystem Vs Economic Valuation
 Repository of novel pharmaceuticals
 55 to 214 new anti-cancer drugs extract from marine species
 world’s oceans- major frontier for medical research
 PharmaMAR (Spain & USA), AquaPharma Biodiversity
Ltd. (UK) & Nereus pharmaceuticals (USA)
 Aventis, Neurex, Novartis and Wyeth

8. Marine Biotechnology:
 Emerging field- Marine biomedical to develop new
products
 Backbone- progress made in Genetics and Genetic
Engineering
 It combats in life-threatening illnesses
 Gene of marine organisms are patented globally
 Blooming of Marine patents and Marine Genetic
Resources (MGRs) result in exploitation of MBD.

9. The applications of gene of marine
organisms Patented:
 Human health (55%)
 Agriculture or
Aquaculture (26%),
 Food (17%)
 Cosmetics (7%)

10. Statistics of Marine Patents:
 Pharmaceutical, Nutritional, Cosmeceutical led to an
incredible coverage by intellectual property in the form
of patents being filed worldwide.
 European Union, United States of America, Japan,
Germany, India and others.
 Among 677 international claims of marine gene patents
deposited between 1991 and 2009, 8648 sequences
from 520 species were found.

11. Cont…
 MGRs related claims are
originate from 31 out of
194 countries in the
world.
 Ten countries own 90%
of the patents deposited
with marine genes, with
70% belonging to the top
three countries.
Country - Marine Organism
patent claims
USA- 199
Germany -149
Japan- 128
France- 34
United Kingdom -33
Denmark- 24
Belgium- 17
Netherland -13
Switzerland -11
Norway -9

12. Recent Developments:
 Current applications- 8% of polyunsaturated fatty acids.
 The patent division of GenBank lists more than 5
million records of DNA sequences deposited in
different patent offices worldwide.
 2008 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for the discovery and
development of GFPs, originally described from the
jellyfish Aequorea victoria.

13. Conservation of Marine Genetic Resources
(MGRs):
 IUCN data shows that 36 of the 340 marine eukaryotic
species reported as a source of genes included in the
patents.
 Thus 8 of the 36 marine species assessed so far are
threatened and 7 of them are qualifying for threatened
in future.

14. Future of MBD: Unknown or Unknowable
 Global market for marine biotechnology estimated US
$2.1 billion in 2002, increasing at a rapid 9.4% from the
previous year.
 Anthropogenic exploitation of Marine Biodiversity
results in more extinction.
 The future exploitation is inevitable.

15. Legal Frameworks to conserve MBD:
Internationally:
 Part VII & Part IX of the United Nation Convention on Law of Seas
(UNCLOS)
 Art. 15- Convention of Biological Diversity (CBD) regulating
access to genetic resources through mutual agreements between
countries of origin of resources and those acquiring them.
 There is no universally accepted legal framework to conserve
MGRs.
 Recent Johannesburg SD summit, 2012 & CBD-COP 11, 2012
failed.

16. National Framework:
 No specific enactment
 Chapter-II, S. 3-7 of the Biological Diversity Act, 2002-
Mandatory provision to get approval from National
Biodiversity Authority (NBA) to obtain Genetic
Resources for exploitation & research.

17. Recommendations:
 Urgent need to develop International Legislation to regulate
conservation of marine resources.
 New authority could be established in line with ISBA &
CBD.
 Economic Instruments’- payment for preserving ecosystems
should also be introduced.
 National Biodiversity Authority (NBA) along with
Zoological Survey of India (ZSI) should frame guidelines

18. Conclusion:
 Government should make effective policies.
Nature protects if She is protected (“Prakruti
Rakshati Rakshita”)