Cupuaçu - a case of amazonian self-assertion

Michael Schmidlehner

The immense biological wealth of the Amazon rainforest has been the subject of plunder for centuries. Through the globalisation of intellectual property rights, it is now being subjected to a new round of colonialisation. Patents have already been granted on literally all well-known Amazonian and Andean medicinal plants, incuding Andiroba (Carapa guianensis Aubl.), Copaiba (Copaifera sp), Cat's Claw (Uncaria tomentosa), Maca (Lepidium meyenii), Sangre de Drago (Croton lechleri), Quebra Pedras (Phyllanthus niruri), and Wormseed (Chenopodium ambrosioides). Almost all of these patents were registered by companies or people from the North.

Recently, a new campaign has been launched by a group of Brazilian NGOs in relation to the Cupuaçu fruit. The campaign began in December 2002, when the NGO Amazonlink.org discovered the existence of several worldwide patent applications on cupuaçu oils and chocolate. It also found that the name of the fruit had been registered as a trademark in the EU, US and Japan by Japan's Asahi Foods and its allied US company, Cupuacu International. Amazonlink's sensitivity to the issue of biopiracy had been aroused when it participated in the international “Growing Diversity” Workshop in Rio Branco, Brazil in May 2002 (see Seedling, July 2002, p 16), and this laid the groundwork for the campaign.

The Cupuaçu campaign addresses a variety of forms of piracy of biological resources and cultural elements – not just patents. Many of the pirated plants have also been trademarked (such as Açai^TM, Sangre de Drago^TM, and Cupuaçu^TM). Many names of plant and indigenous peoples have also been registered as internet domains for commercial purposes, such as www.cupuacu.com, www.cupuacu-int.com, www.sangrededrago.com, www.yanomami.com and www.ashaninka.com.

The campaign is being coordinated by the Brazilian network Amazonian Work Group (GTA) in collaboration with Amazonlink.org, other NGOs and groups of small producers. A challenge has been submitted against the Japanese trademark number 4126269 CUPUAÇU at the Japanese Patent Office. In Germany, a group of NGOs is preparing an objection against patent request EP1219698A1 on Cupuaçu oils and chocolate at the European Patent Office. The campaign has many plans including workshops, websites and awareness-raising activities amongst local communities. The Cupuaçu case is attracting a great deal of attention in Brazil and first meetings with government members have been very positive. The campaigners believe that the Lula government, especially via Environment Minister Marina Silva, will contribute to civil societies' fight against biopiracy and take a determined approach against biopiracy via the World Intellectual Property Organisation. There is a sense of a new era dawning in Brazil and the Cupuaçu case could become a landmark in the formation of Amazonian and Brazilian civil society's self-assertion and capacity to act.

At a first glance, the biopiracy issue appears to unify different social and political groups. It is common sense in Brazil to be concerned when a Japanese company to register trademarks and patents on an Amazonian fruit. But at the deeper level, it becomes clear that there are many different ideas about what it means to fight biopiracy. On one hand there are efforts to preserve biological and cultural diversity by strengthening indigenous groups as autonomous partners in this process. On the other hand there is a quite opposite approach. For many years conservative groups in Brazil have been arbitrarily accusing NGOs and indigenous organisations of facilitating biopiracy and causing what they call the “internatonalisation” of the Amazon. In order to prevent this, they propose large-scale military projects and the reshaping of environmental and indigenous policies in the interests of ‘national security'. There is a need for factual information and an open discussion, so people can make up their minds and will not be seduced by oversimplistic xenophobic argumentation.

Another important issue which must be considered is that the Western concept of ‘property' is not necessarily inherent in indigenous cultures. Their non-conformity in this realm has always led to prejudice and discrimination against these cultures and caused their disadvantage. They are condemned to be permanent losers in a game whose rules are established and constantly reinvented by the other side. Filing requests for the revoking of patents and trademarks can only be a small part of the strategy to realise the autonomy of indigenous peoples. Even efforts to create legal mechanisms to protect traditional knowledge will not resolve the problem in the long run. If we are interested in sustainable development and fair relations with traditional cultures, the discussion must go to the roots of the problem. Patents on life forms must be rejected and the concept of intellectual property itself needs to be reassessed.

For information about the campaign and on-line protest, visit www.amazonlink.org/biopirataria or email .
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Reference for this article: Michael Schmidlehner, 2003, Cupuaçu – a case of Amazonian self-assertion , Seedling, April 2003, GRAIN

Website link: www.grain.org/seedling/seed-03-04-5-en.cfm

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