CONVENTION ON BIOLOGICAL DIVERSITY AND THE NAGOYA PROTOCOL: PROTECTION OF TRADITIONAL KNOWLEDGE IN NIGERIA

Abstract

The continued sustenance of human being is, to a large extent, dependent on the conservation and/or preservation of the biological diversity in his particular environment. The totality of living thing around human being - ecosystems, species and genetic resources - is useful for his existence and sustained development as well. But over the ages, biological diversity has been challenged by different issues like degradation, pollution, alien invasions and so forth which has led to the extinction of some biological diversity at one time or the other. In addition to these is the crucial challenge of patenting the traditional knowledge in genetic resources of traditional communities without due regard to same as their cultural heritage that need yield economic interest as well as morally deserving attribution. The international frameworks to tackle this challenge have also addressed the need to have different interests protected including the local or indigenous communities. With the aid of doctrinal method of research, this work aim at exploring the provisions of the international instruments being the Convention on Biological Diversity and the Nagoya Protocol on Access to Equitable Sharing of Benefits arising from the utilization of genetic resources cum how they relate to the protection of local and indigenous communities. It concludes that the instruments are targeted towards human sustainability generally but needs domestication and enforcement in our developing environments for there to be efficacy in the protection of the traditional knowledge in the biodiversity of local communities from misuse, misappropriation and abuse.