news and notesbe introduced to the market at the beginning of 2005. volkswagen will also begin to...

AMAZON FIBRES

Vegetable plastic The fibre extracted from a plant native toAmazonia could replace conventionalfibreglass owing to its environmental andeconomical advantages. This is theconclusion of a study carried out byresearchers of the State University ofCampinas (UNICAMP), Brazil. Theinvestigation was initiated in 2003 byKaren Fermoselli, a student at theChemistry Institute.

“The fibre of the curaua (Ananaserectifolius) costs less, and is lighter thanfibreglass, in addition to its beingobtained from renewable resources andbeing biodegradable,” states theChemistry Institute’s Coordinator, MarcoAurelio De Paoli. Fibreglass requires avery high energy consumption to produceit, is more costly and has a highenvironmental impact. The study hasshown that plastic reinforced with thisfibre is much lighter than fibreglass. As aresult, cars produced with this materialwill tend to be lighter, reducing totalweight and, consequently, theconsumption of petrol. According to De

Paoli, car manufacturers are alreadyusing this vegetable fibre.

The curaua is well known in theAmazonia Water Basin in the westernregion of Pará state, where the firstcommercial plantations were started.Each plant produces between 20 and 24leaves, offering approximately 2 kg offibre. (Source: Agência FAPESP, 4 April2004 [in Amazon News, 8 April 2004].)

Natural fibres for carsBrazil could be a pioneer in the intensiveuse of natural fibres for car production.Assembly-line workers already use analternative prime material such as thefibres from coconut and from jute, agaveand cotton, and they have carried outadvance research in the hope ofintroducing more materials fromrenewable resources. Throughout theworld, industry searches for alternativesto replace those derived from petroleum,used in various car components. Withrenewable natural resources, areas forplanting and a varied species of plants,Brazil has the chance to be a leader inthis realm.

Currently, in all Fox models,Volkswagen has seat coverings and theroof and boot covers made of curauafibre. This plant from Amazonia which issimilar to a pineapple will also be used forthe CrossFox, a new version which willbe introduced to the market at thebeginning of 2005.

Volkswagen will also begin to usecoconut fibre on the seats of the Paratiand the Saveiro, a product which isalready utilized by Mercedes-Benz. “Inaddition to the aspect of recycling, theproduct is more resistant than common

resin,” affirmed Mercedes-Benz. Thisproduct is used in the seats and the panelcovers, and thermic comfort is one of theadvantages of natural fibres. Ventilationis improved and absorbs the change inbody temperature. In addition to this,following 400 km of use in tests, the seatsmaintain their original configurationwithout deformation. (Source: O Estadode S. Paulo, 24 October 2004 [in AmazonNews, 28 October 2004].)

Ecovogt, textile based on Amazonia plants Caio von Vogt, a designer from Pará, hascreated a new cloth (which carries hisname: ecovogt) from aquatic plants fromthe Amazonia riverside regions. Theweave was developed using nativepopulations’ experience, which theyinherited from the indigenous peoples forthe method of weaving the fibres.

The designer’s idea is that the riverainpopulations will supply prime material. Inthis way, he believes that it will behelping the region preserve itstechniques and native vegetation. Pricescould reach $R 18 per metre, which isclose to the price of linen at $R 15 permetre.

Because it is an ecological material,von Vogt believes that the product haseverything necessary to conquerEuropean markets. (Source: O Estadode S. Paulo, 2 October 2004 [in AmazonNews, 7 October 2004].)

ARE RAMP FESTIVALSSUSTAINABLE?

Beyond timber: certification of non-timber forest productsFor the past four years, Jim Chamberlain,research forest products technologist forthe USDA Forest Service SouthernResearch Station unit in Blacksburg,Virginia, United States, has driven down tothe mountains of western North Carolina todig ramps with the festivals that are aspringtime tradition in the southernAppalachians.

Ramps (Allium tricoccum) are anacquired taste: the flavour has beendescribed as similar to leeks, scallions or

N E W S A N D N O T E S

“Non-Wood Forest Products (NWFP)consist of goods of biological originother than wood, derived fromforests, other wooded land and treesoutside forests.”

«Les produits forestiers non ligneuxsont des biens d’origine biologiqueautres que le bois, dérivés des forêts,des autres terres boisées, et desarbres hors forêts.»

«Productos forestales no madererosson los bienes de origen biológicodistintos de la madera derivados delos bosques, de otras tierrasboscosas y de los árboles fuera delos bosques.»

(FAO’s working definition)

NON-WOOD NEWS, No. 12, March 2005

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garlic. People collect both the leaves andthe spicy bulb as a spring tonic, a traditionthat the early settlers may have learnedfrom the Indians. Most people eat rampsfreshly picked, fried with potatoes or eggs– or they cook up a “mess” with freshlycaught trout and fatback. Gatherings withcooking and music have naturally formedaround the spring collection of ramps.Over the last few decades, these festivalshave evolved into a major funding sourcefor rural fire departments, rescue squadsand other community organizations.

In 1999, Chamberlain startedcontacting the major festivals in thesouthern Appalachian region and begandigging for ramps. He keeps track of thetotal weight and numbers of rampscollected for each festival and has foundthat the major groups use 500 to 600pounds (about 230-270 kg) of ramps foran annual festival, with between 40 and80 bulbs making up a pound.

Chamberlain’s data are tied to specificcollection areas, enabling him to compareramp populations in different watersheds,or to determine whether a particularcollection method affects the size of theplants or populations available thefollowing year.

Ramps emerge from the moist, shadyfloors of southern Appalachian forests inlate March and early April. The plantssend up a circle of smooth, broad leavesthat die back in early summer, leaving theplant virtually invisible. Ramps flower inJune or July: the few seeds producedtake a year or longer to germinate, andthree to five years to grow into a largebulb. Fortunately, ramps also reproducefrom rhizomes, the rootlike stems that rununderground. Bulbs can also split,producing two individual plants. Rampcollectors typically dig clumps out of largepatches of plants, leaving individuals inthe resulting gaps to form new patches forthe following year.

Chamberlain’s data show that the majorramp festivals use a total of about 3 200pounds (1 450 kg) of ramps each spring.This figure does not include the plantscollected for roadside stands, restaurantsand personal use. In the spring of 2002,the Great Smoky Mountains National Park

banned the collection of ramps after afive-year study indicated a decline in ramppopulations in the park. This shifted moredemand on to national forest lands.

Most of the ramp festivals collect onNational Forest land. “We don’t know ifthe current levels of ramp harvesting aresustainable or not,” said Chamberlain.“We have heard that some of the ramppopulations are in decline, but we can’tdetermine if this is true without monitoringpopulations and harvests over severalyears. Since most of these groups arecollecting from National Forest lands, weneed to start looking at how to includetraditional collectors in developingguidance on ramps for forestmanagement plans. Many of the groups Idig with are very interested in workingwith the Forest Service on sustainablemanagement.”

For more information, please contact:

Jim Chamberlain, USDA Forest Service,

Southern Research Station, 200 Weaver

Boulevard, PO Box 2680, Asheville, NC

28802, USA.

E-mail: [email protected];

www.srs4702.forprod.vt.edu/unit/ramps

.htm

BEES

Forest makes coffee farm richerSeven percent of a Costa Rican coffeefarm’s annual income (US$62 000) comesdirectly from the pollination “services” ofadjacent tropical forest, according to anew study in the Proceedings of theNational Academy of Sciences. The studyis the first to quantify in such detail the

economic value of pollination servicesfrom tropical forests.

“This study illustrates that there arecompelling economic reasons forconserving native ecosystems,” saidTaylor Ricketts, the principal author of thestudy and director of the World WideFund for Nature’s Conservation ScienceProgramme. “Because the benefits wederive from ecosystems are difficult toquantify, they are often assumed to beworthless.”

Ricketts’ team investigated pollinationon coffee plants at three distances fromthe forest: near (100 m), intermediate(800 m), and far (1 600 m). The areasclosest to the forest experienced morepollination by wild bees, which increasedcoffee yields and decreased the numberof deformed beans, compared with theplants farthest from the forest. Hand-pollinated branches served as thecontrol.

The study found that the value oftropical forest is likely to be greater thanother land uses for which forests areoften destroyed. Cattle pasture, forexample, would yield approximatelyUS$24 000 a year, less than half of thatprovided by pollination services to thecoffee plantation. “The fact thatpollination services alone are so valuableto an individual farm demonstrates howconservation is compatible with economicdevelopment,” continued Ricketts.“Protecting natural ecosystems canbenefit both biodiversity and localpeople.” (Source: GreenBiz.com, 4August 2004 [on WBCSD Web site].)

Taking the sting out of beekeeping in South Africa“Our people used to smoke out bees,which resulted in the burning of theforests. That’s one of the reasons why theAfrican indigenous bee is threatened withextinction. Our task now is to conservethis bee,” Rejoice Mabudafhasi, DeputyMinister of Environmental Affairs andTourism, told IPS. The African bee isregarded as the most aggressive of beespecies. But, “it’s also the mosthardworking in the world. And its honeyhas got a sweet natural taste.”



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the support of the forestry officials [to dothis],” the foundation says. “People inAfrica have always been bee hunters notbeekeepers. Our role is to educate themand make them become beekeepers.”(Source: Inter Press Service[Johannesburg], 4 June 2004.)

Bee Foundation to sign dealThe Department of Environmental Affairsand Tourism, South Africa, will sign anagreement with the Bee Foundationtomorrow in an effort to intensifypartnership between the two. The twopartners started working together in June,when Deputy Minister RejoiceMabudafhasi launched a R 2 billionIndigenous Bee Conservation project inLimpopo to conserve the African bee.

The project is expected to create self-employment especially in rural areas andalso encourage people to play an activerole in economic development.

Honey production depends largely onareas where bees can get the necessarynectar, water and the labour to protecttheir hives. For this reason, people arereceiving training weeks for bee farmingand bee production. (Source: BuaNews[Pretoria], 12 August 2004.)

Zambian honey gets German fair trade certificateThe North Western Bee Products ofZambia has earned a German fair tradecertification for its honey. General managerBob Malichi said that last year alone thecompany had exported 144 tonnes ofhoney to Germany and the UnitedKingdom. Malichi said there was atremendous demand for organic honey inthe United Kingdom and Germany andadded that the company’s honey wasorganic and was traded fairly, hence the

German certification. He explained thecertification was one of the highest ratingson the world market for bee products. “Ouronly threat is China which producesmassive quantities of honey.”

The company is the second largestemployer in the province after thegovernment. It has 6 472 registeredbeekeepers and has contributedenormously to poverty reduction.

Honey costs £1 200 per tonne, whilebeeswax costs £2 300 per tonne.

The company is now looking at theplight of women by encouraging theirinvolvement in beekeeping. (Source: ThePost [Lusaka], 7 June 2004.)

Beekeeping centre opened in Armenia A Multi Agro Beekeeping centre hasopened in Armenia and is working with 2 567 beekeepers. This year 14 tonnesof honey were produced but half of thatamount was used to feed the bees. Thecentre’s director plans to export not onlythe honey, but also pollen andmedicines. (Source: A1 Plus, 19September 2004 [in INFO CENN, 30September 2004].)

Uganda gets ready to export honey The government is to invest in a honeyprocessing plant in Kabale. Kabale MPand Minister of Parliamentary Affairs, MsHope Mwesigye, said the decision wasbased on the large supply of honey fromthe district. She said the plant wouldprocess honey for export, provide amarket for the honey farmers and createemployment.

Mwesigye called on farmers to producemore honey to sustain the processing plantover the years. She said that the market forthe processed honey had been identified inthe Great Lakes Region and withinUganda. “Use local and modern methodsof beekeeping in order to increase honeyproduction so that you can sustain theprocessing plant. Plant trees and flowers toact as food centres for the bees if they areto make you enough honey,” she said. Sheadvised farmers to get loans from thebanking institutions to boost their businessenterprises. (Source:The Monitor[Kampala], 15 November 2004.)

This flavour – and the role bees play inpollinating the crops that supply fruit forSouth Africa’s large fruit industry – hasensured that the insects have economicas well as environmental worth. The beeindustry is currently thought to be worthalmost US$466 million, according tovarious sources.

As part of its efforts to alert SouthAfricans to the value of bees, the BeeFoundation, a private company based inPretoria that will be working with thegovernment to train new beekeepers,plans to help 100 000 people in ruralareas set up their own beekeepingbusinesses over a three-year period. It willsell specially designed beehives (whichcome equipped with bee populations) tothese people at a reduced rate of aboutUS$62 each.

When the honey is ready forharvesting, staff from the Bee Foundationwill collect it, paying the farmers a fairprice for their honey. As each hive isexpected to yield at least 20 kg of honeyevery year, the farmers could look forwardto a gross annual income of about US$2 500. After repaying the loans takenout to buy the hives, the farmers wouldhave a net monthly income of US$155 –no small amount in a country where mostof the population was impoverished byapartheid.

South Africa currently has as many as10 000 beekeepers, but there is room foran additional 10 000, according toindustry analysts. According to the BeeFoundation, “We produce only 2 000tonnes per year, yet consume 3 000tonnes per year. To fill the gap we import1 000 tonnes every year from China andAustralia. Yet South Africa has thecapacity to produce 100 000 tonnes ofhoney per year.”

Mabudafhasi believes that alertingpeople to the value of bees will put an endto the destructive practice of smokingthem out.

Bee farming has many advantages butthis potentially lucrative activity has, untilnow, been largely ignored in Africa.

“We have millions of hives in the trees.We need to bring the bees from the wildinto the boxes – and we have asked for



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sustainable endeavour. (Source:Biological Conservation Newsletter,September 2004.)

Samoa to profit from indigenousknowledge dealThe Samoan Government and theUniversity of California at Berkeley(United States) have signed anagreement to share equally the profitsfrom a potential anti-HIV drug –prostratin – derived from the bark ofSamoa’s indigenous mamala tree.

The drug is also being tested in clinicaltrials by the AIDS Research Alliance,which pledged in 2001 to give 20 percentof any profits back to the country.

Researchers at Berkeley will first needto isolate the genes of the mamala treethat produce prostratin. The gene willthen be inserted into bacteria to create“microbial factories” that can churn outmuch larger quantities of the drug thancould be produced naturally.

The researchers are working incollaboration with ethnobotanist PaulAlan Cox, who first learned of prostatin’santiviral properties from local healers.The agreement, which allocates a 50percent share of commercial profits to theSamoan people, is novel, says Cox, inthat “it may be the first time thatindigenous people have extended theirnational sovereignty over a genesequence.”

Indigenous knowledge is increasinglybeing recognized as a valuable resourcefor commercial products such aspharmaceuticals. But the absence of alegally binding international treatygoverning the intellectual property rightsregarding such local knowledge meansthat it is open to exploitation.

The agreement signed in Samoaseems, on the surface at least, to be awin-win situation. According to onecomment, the pact will “set a precedentfor biodiversity conservation and geneticresearch” and for future commercial useof indigenous knowledge.

Not everyone is so positive, however.Rudolph Ryser, chair of the Centre forWorld Indigenous Studies, believes “theagreement is destined to falter”.

BIOPROSPECTINGOR BIOPIRACY?

Making bioprospecting a sustainable endeavour“What’s in it for us?” seems to be thequestion asked by all parties involved indrug discovery in developing countries,and too often the answer is “not enough”.The 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiroresulted in the Convention on BiologicalDiversity, which intended to makeconservation a win-win proposition forgovernments, commercial companiesand scientists. Governments ofbiologically diverse developing nations,however, remain suspicious of privateinterests, and companies seemingly donot reap sufficient compensation for thesignificant wading through localregulations that establishing cooperativeprogrammes involves.

Panama’s bioprospecting project – thePanama International CooperativeBiodiversity Group (ICBG) – is featured inthe 10 June [2004] issue of Nature as oneof the few programmes “getting it right”.Now in its sixth year, ICBG employs tensenior scientists in six laboratoriesrepresenting a consortium of internationaland local research organizations with theaim of discovering novel compounds forcontrolling cancer, AIDS and otherdiseases.

The project yields immediate rewardsfor developing countries: training localmicrobiologists, creating jobs andpromoting conservation. Unlike manyprojects, in which a share in the royaltiesfor products that make it to the market isthe only reward for local researchers andgovernments, Panama’s ICBG wasdesigned to make bioprospecting a

According to Ryser, such agreementscannot be fairly made until mutuallyagreed international protocols are put inplace. He adds that, rather than signingagreements to share profits with localpeople, drug developers should insteadaim to provide drugs free of charge.(Source: SciDev.Net Weekly Update,4–10 October 2004.)

Indigenous knowledge and rights must be protectedIndigenous knowledge of biodiversity isimportant to the lives of millions, notleast through the provision of food andmedicine. But, according to AlejandroArgumendo, director of Peru’s Quechua-Aymara Association for SustainableCommunities International, intellectualproperty laws foster the privatization ofsuch knowledge, rather than itsprotection.

He says that the definitions and uses oftraditional knowledge are affectingindigenous rights. Internationalframeworks, he says, are not able toestablish or protect the rights of thosewho are the very source of traditionalknowledge.

Argumendo highlights the importanceof conserving both biodiversity and thetraditional systems of knowledge transferand exploitation that are central to itssustainable exploitation. (Source: LAPress [in SciDev.Net Weekly Update,12–18 July 2004].)

Katemfe (Thaumatococcus danielli):sweet prospects turn sourA promising new crop in Ghana, withexport potential, could be stillbornbecause of patent claims on genes andgenetic engineering. The potential newcrop is katemfe, an indigenous shrub,which is a source of the naturalsweetener thaumatin. Non-sugarsweeteners are now a multibillion dollarindustry, and demand continues to grow.Ghana had plans to benefit by growingkatemfe as an agroforestry crop andbuilding a processing plant to extractthaumatin. However, plans are stalled bypatents filed in the United States, whereresearchers from the University of



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UK wildlife must not be patented for profitPatenting the genetic make-up ofEngland’s wildlife could lead tocompanies commercializing geneswithout any benefit for the British publicor the environment and should beresisted by the government, according toFriends of the Earth.

The warning comes as England’s officialwildlife watchdog, English Nature, is saidto be “on the verge of striking a deal tobioprospect some of Britain’s most famousnature reserves” despite no legal or ethicalframework being in place to ensure thatany genetic exploitation benefits the Britishpeople. (Source: Press Release, Friendsof the Earth, 23 March 2004.)

BIRCH BARK EXTRACT –A VALUE ADDED BOREALPRODUCT

Chemist Pavel Krasutsky calls birch barknature’s “white gold”. Betulin, a powderysubstance in the outer bark of the birchtree, has been shown to help woundsheal faster and cut inflammation. Manycosmetic companies, touting it as a skintoner and restorer, add birch bark extractto some of their products. And acompound, betulinic acid, is being testedas a treatment for melanoma and otherserious diseases.

But birch bark has largely been burnedas fuel after the trees have beenharvested for lumber. “This is a miraclewhich nature synthesized for us and weare burning this miracle like cheap fuel,”Krasutsky said as he worked in hislaboratory at the University of Minnesota-Duluth’s Natural Resources ResearchInstitute (NRRI).

California and Lucky Biotech Corporationmay have enforceable patents on alltransgenic fruits, seeds and vegetablesresponsible for producing thaumatin. It isalso reported that the multinational foodgiant, Unilever, has successfully insertedthaumatin-producing genes into bacteria,which could provide a very low-costalternative source of thaumatin.

According to Genetic Resources ActionInternational (GRAIN), thaumatinproduction based on geneticallymanipulated bacteria would undermineany conventional production in Ghana.However, the Ghanaians and theirGerman business partners hope that theymay be able to develop a niche marketfor a “naturally” produced sweetenerbased on their conventionally grownkatemfe, and that this will also benefitmany thousands of growers in Ghana.(Source: New Agriculturist online[www.new-agri.co.uk/04-2/newsbr.html].)

Malaysian state acts to thwart biopiratesThe biodiversity-rich Malaysian state ofSabah, on the island of Borneo, is goingto require non-governmentalorganizations to get approval from thestate authorities before conducting anyresearch there. The move was agreedafter a discussion held by officials fromstate ministries in August 2004. It isintended to stop biopiracy – the act ofgaining benefit from a country’sbiological resources without faircompensation.

The decision means that allapplications to do research in Sabah willfirst have to be approved by the StateEconomic Planning Unit. The Researchand Internal Affairs Office of Sabah’schief minister’s department will thenassess applications for final approval.(Source: Daily Express [Malaysia], 22October 2004 [in SciDev.Net WeeklyUpdate, 18–24 October 2004].)

Biopiracy of indigenous Africanknowledge Tanzanian President Benjamin Mkapacriticized multinational corporations fortheir tendency to engage in biopiracy ofindigenous African knowledge in order toreap huge profits.

The president said: “The globalintellectual property rights regime mustprevent biopiracy that seeks to patentbiological materials, especially plants,known throughout our generations fortheir value and altered in laboratories toclaim an invention and win a patent.” Headded: “… multinationals make hugeprofits from exploiting African biodiversity.It is imperative, therefore, that theIndigenous Knowledge (IK) within theintellectual property rights regime bereappraised to allow communities andcountries to also lay claims to the intrinsicknowledge extracted from IK withoutrecompense.”

President Mkapa also said that Africanshad in many cases been losing their ownproperty based on IK as a result ofongoing biopiracy. “In many cases, wehave lost what has been ours but whichhas been exploited by others andultimately even rendered inaccessible tous as original contributors to the valuechain of what turned out to becommercially available products.”

“Africa has a rich reservoir oftransgenerational knowledge andpractical experiences that can beexploited to complement ourdevelopment efforts,” he said, adding thatIK was an important tool for fightingpoverty through locally basedinnovations. (Source: The Guardian [Dares Salaam], 21 October 2004 [in BIO-IPR, 11 November 2004].)

Amazonlink (Brazil) has launched anew site on biopiracy that containsdocumentation regarding 12 examplesof biopiracy or illegitimate registeringof trademarks. They involve well-known and other less famous cases,such as a substance – of theWapixana People of Roraima, thebiribiri (Octotea radioei ) – registeredby a Canadian company. (Source:ComCiencia, 22 March 2004 [inAmazon News, 25 March 2004].)

BIOPIRACY WEB SITE


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That is changing, partly through apartnership formed in 2000 by NRRI,Potlatch Corporation and Synertec, anAllete subsidiary, to build on researchbeing done at the university. The Duluth-based partnership, NaturNorthTechnologies LLC, has developed apatented process to isolate pure betulinand other compounds cost-effectivelyfrom birch bark in very large quantities.NaturNorth scientists have also patenteda way to convert betulin to betulinic acid.The partners, opting to go into businessinstead of licensing the patents to others,hope that demand for the birch barkcompounds will grow enough to givethem a lucrative venture.

Potlatch, a wood products and paperproducer, can contribute raw material –at least 45 360 kg of birch bark daily. Thebark yields about 10 percent of betulin.Once the compounds are isolated,scientists can produce new derivatives toexpand the range of potential uses.That’s how NaturNorth creates betulinicacid from betulin.

NaturNorth, which has only small testproduction capabilities, pays a companyin Canada to do the large-scaleproduction work and another in theUnited States to do smaller-scalederivative work, mostly for cosmeticsuse. Although birch bark extracts arealready used in some cosmetics,NaturNorth offers the pure compoundsfound in the bark. To get to this point,however, NaturNorth was forced to find away of removing the small amount ofbetulinic acid that occurs naturally inbirch bark before it could offer anycompounds to the cosmetics industry.Unilever NV had patented the use ofbetulinic acid in cosmetics and licensedthe exclusive worldwide patent rights toPremier Specialties Inc. of the UnitedStates. Premier has been selling birchbark extract to the cosmetics industrysince the mid-1990s.

Although NaturNorth expects tobenefit from supplying pure birch barkcompounds other than betulinic acid foruse in cosmetics, it is the ability to isolateand derive from the pure compounds –especially changing the betulin molecule

to create betulinic acid in large quantities– that has Krasutsky thinking of whitegold.

Betulinic acid has been explored as apotential treatment for skin cancer formore than a decade, and that is one areaNaturNorth is interested in. Betulin and itsderivatives and other birch barkcompounds are also being tested foreffectiveness in treating HIV andrespiratory syncytial virus. The barkcompounds and derivatives are alsobeing tested for effectiveness in cropdisease management and preventingfungus growth on golf course turf. Inaddition to their other patents, Carlson,Krasutsky and colleagues have patentedthe use of betulin to treat herpescosmetically and have other patentapplications pending. Carlson said thatNaturNorth hopes to supply betulinic acidand its derivatives to other scientistsdoing clinical tests on their use in treatingdisease and, ultimately – if the tests aresuccessful – to become the supplierwhen the products are commercialized.No human testing has been conductedyet on betulinic acid as a treatment formelanoma, HIV or RSV, he said, butthose tests are planned once researchersget regulatory approval.

A Russian company, Birch World Ltd ofMoscow, has also developed a method ofisolating betulin from birch bark and hasbeen producing commercial quantities.Birch World sells cosmetics and foodsupplements containing betulin in Europeand Japan, but has no North Americancustomers. (Source: “Using technology totap birch bark’s potential”, AssociatedPress, in [email protected])

BUGGINGSANDALWOOD TREES

The state of Kerala (India) is resorting todrastic measures to defend its dwindlingforests of rare sandalwood trees fromillegal logging: its Forest Department isplanning to use satellite tracking toprotect the trees. Under the plan,microchips will be embedded inside thetrees. Forestry officials will then be ableto use a satellite to monitor the trees. Notonly will any attempt to cut them down bedetected but the Forest Department willbe able to trace the movements of anysmugglers who try to take timber out ofthe area.

The trade in contraband sandalwoodis one of the most lucrative in India.

Amid the money and greed, India’sprecious reserves are in increasingdanger. Just three years ago, therewere 62 000 sandalwood trees inKerala’s Marayur Forest. This year,there are 55 000. The last sizeablesandalwood forests in the world are insouthern India, spread across Kerala,Karnataka and Tamil Nadu.

A properly managed and sustainabletrade in sandalwood is vital to theregion’s economy. The sandalwood treehas been prized for its natural scent forcenturies and its oil is used in themanufacture of perfumes worldwide.Sandalwood is also used in incense –an esoteric buy in the West, but a staplein much of Asia. And the soft, scentedwood is prized for carving and it is usedin some Indian medicines.

All this puts sandalwood in greatdemand – but there are relatively fewsources. Sources elsewhere have beenoverexploited: in Australia, most of thelittle that is left is protected andIndonesia’s stocks are almostexhausted.

With its huge reserves, India hasdone more than any other country to setup a sustainable trade in sandalwood,with strict laws on when trees can befelled and planting to replenish theforests. But the implementation of thelaws is poor: local politicians are often


17

paid by smugglers and the huge forestsare too big to patrol.

Satellite tracking will enable officials tomonitor the forests and, hopefully, withpublicity, shame the politicians intoaction. (Source: The Independent [Delhi],12 November 2004.)

BUTTERFLY FARMING

A group of some 300 farmers in the EastUsamabara mountains of the UnitedRepublic of Tanzania have abandonedsubsistence farming and meagrely paidwork on tea estates to become small-scale cash crop entrepreneurs. Their newventure? Butterfly farming. The farmerscollect unhatched butterflies and sendthem on to Europe and the United Stateswhere there is considerable demand forbutterfly exhibits.

This initiative is being undertakenwithin the framework of the AmaniButterfly Project which seeks to promoteconservation by providing communities inthe East Usambara Mountains with asustainable income that is directlydependent on healthy forests. Anestimated 61 percent of earnings godirectly to the butterfly farmers, 7 percentto community development, 25 percentfor project running costs, and 7 percent tothe Tanzania Wildlife Division. (For moreinformation, please visit:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/3569164.stm) (Source: Peak to Peak, TheMountain Partnership Newsletter,September 2004.)

CERTIFICATION:COMMUNITY MANAGEMENTFOR MULTIPLE USES

The members of the Association ofRubberworkers of the Extractivist ReserveSão Luiz do Remanso, in Acre state, arethe first in Brazil to obtain ForestStewardship Council (FSC) certification forcommunity management for multiple uses.

Four certified community forests existin Acre today, totalling 14 000 ha. ThePorto Dias community management, alsoin Acre state, which had already receivedits certification for timber, in April obtainedthe certification for its first primaryproduct: copaiba oil.

What is new with the São Luiz doRemanso’s certifications is that variousproducts have been certified, includingjarina, also known as vegetable ivory, andtree barks. This settlement project has anarea of 7 205 ha. The products to beextracted with the FSC green seal aretimber in log form, tree barks, the copaibaoil and the jarina seed.

Jarina is a seed from an incrediblybeautiful palm tree, used to make artesianjewellery. It is a rare species and sparkedthe interest of the pharmaceutical andcosmetics industry owing to itsantiscarring, anti-inflammatory anddiuretic properties. The certification willbenefit 47 families. (Source: AltinoMachado, 26 November 2004 [in AmazonNews, 2 December 2004].)

CERTIFICATION PROBLEMSAND GUIDELINES FORBOTANICAL AND FAUNANON-WOOD FORESTPRODUCTS

In view of the current increasingly moreglobalized economy and trade, weurgently need tools to promote, ship andsell NWFP products.

Our non-governmental organization,Instituto de Investigación de la Biologíade las Cordilleras Orientales (INIBICO),is specialized in neotropical faunalmanagement and our first pilot projects inPeru cover the production of poison dartfrogs for the pet trade. However, we alsowork with commercial insects andmedicinal plants which are all based ontotally sustainable production andmanagement methods with a newbiotechnology transferred to the poorestlocal forest inhabitants or nativecommunities in Peru and, later, also toneighbouring countries.

The principal goal of our institution is togenerate income from the standing rainforest; this is the only way to save it forthe future. Poison dart frogs are CITESAppendix II species (some should be onCITES I). CITES tries to control the tradeof the poison frogs, but with very doubtfulresults. Moreover, CITES does not solvethe primary reason that poison frogs areendangered: the constant andunavoidable original habitat loss all overtheir distribution range in South andCentral America.

Making our first medium-sized projectwith the World Bank’s subunit,International Finance Corporationapplying for a Global Environment Facilitygrant, we spent a lot of effort in ourmarket study and presented acertification proposal for reallysustainably produced frogs, usingmethods that create no impact on thenatural ecosystems, the local fauna or thegenetic primary resources of thecountries of origin (the adult reproductorsmust stay in the original habitat). Themethods were specifically designed towork in protected parks also or naturereserves and their buffer zones. Thegoods to be exported are live juvenilepoison dart frogs obtained with our newproduction methods. For better access tofuture markets and to distinguish ourtotally sustainably produced frogs fromthe smuggled ones or captive bred onesin Europe, the United States or Japan, weneed a certification similar to that of theForest Stewardship Council for tropicaltimber. We proposed this to IUCN–World


Three seizures of the CITES AppendixII-listed Red Sandalwood, an aromaticwood found only in India, have beenmade by Singaporean authorities in2004. The shipments, totalling 56tonnes, were all intercepted bycustoms officers after arriving fromIndia. (Extracted from: TRAFFIC PressBriefing, 15 November 2004.)


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Conservation Union and the Conventionon International Trade in EndangeredSpecies of Wild Fauna and Flora(CITES), but they are not interested yet inresolving this urgent need. Therefore wediscussed this matter with Trade RecordsAnalysis of Flora and Fauna inCommerce (TRAFFIC), South AmericaOffice, who are interested in elaboratingtogether with us certification guidelines,the certification procedure, the logotypeand all other aspects of this process.

From the last four numbers of Non-Wood News, we see that there are a lot ofproblems with such certifications. Someof them we consider simply fake or evendangerous in the biological sense, suchas the one for “ecologically producedcoffee” in Peru and other countries. Afterlegal and illegal timber, coffee is the worstcrop worldwide, exterminating uniquebiodiversity in premontane and montanerain forest ranges in every country wherecoffee is produced. So one should thinktwice before drinking a cup of thisbiodiversity-killing product and anycertification process treating with the“ecological” certification of coffeeplantations must be extremely rigorous.Today, many people and certificationinstitutions confuse agropesticide ortoxin-free coffee certification with“ecological coffee certification”: suchmisuses of this term should be bannedworldwide.

Moreover, one cannot certify as a“green” or “ecological” product anyNWFP resource obtained by simplecollecting procedures if there is nomanagement involved which perfectlywarrants the survival of the resource tobe certified. The current problems Brazil(and Peru) has with the totallyunsustainable simple collecting of theBrazil nut without warranting the naturalregeneration of the nut-trees (Bertholletiaexcelsa) is a good example that such aproduct cannot be certified as“ecologically produced” and therefore isnot qualified to receive a place in theinternational “green products” trade. Onlyforest ranges where a sufficiently highamount of young Bertholletia nut-treesare grown under the measured control of

“natural regeneration” or an improvednut-tree management with a controlledreforestation phase with young nut-treesaplings by local nut harvestingcommunities may receive a real “GreenProduct” certification. The problemsBrazil has at the moment owing to highcancer-inducing fungal infection residues,such as aflatoxin in the nuts, is a clearindicator of incorrect post-harvest nutmanagement. This may be improved withsimple methods which prevent the fungusattacking the harvested fruits if storedand handled under very humidconditions. In a forest with abundantBertholletia trees under management, itis even possible to harvest some of thetrees if we ensure that enough youngones are growing up (nut-trees usuallyprovide excellent wood for furniture).

In Brazil, many places with Bertholletiastands can also be used to produce high-priced poison frogs with our fullysustainable production methods, whichconsiderably improve the cash output ofsuch forest plots by linking in a faunalmanagement (Manaus, Acre). We haveobserved that Brazil overprotects itsnatural resources at the moment withouttaking advantage of managing theseresources for export. In addition, insteadof producing those frogs, for example,with totally sustainable methods, marketneeds are met by illegally caught poisonfrogs smuggled with aquarium fishshipments from Manaus. Individuals andgovernment authorities who areinterested should contact us to help themimprove rain forest management in orderto keep it standing. This is also similar toWorld Bank strategies which state that “itis economically better to protect the stillstanding rain forests than reforestingthem”. But this method is only successfulif we give a monetary value to thesurviving forest and learn to createincomes from it, thus also improving thelife of poor farmers or nativecommunities; this helps CITES tomaintain intact the original habitatnetwork of CITES II frogs and cut downillegal smuggling. Once the forest hasbeen rescued, other resources such asbirds, monkeys, medicinal plants, flowers,

commercial insects or aquarium fishescan survive together with the frogs andcan be managed with similar methods.

Another problem we have is with theharvesting, production and certification ofmedicinal plants. At the moment, Peru isentering a control process for the use andproduction of medicinal plants which areimportant primary resources for a fastgrowing market of “natural medicine”products. More than 3 000 identifiedmedicinal plants in Peru (and some 3 000more not yet discovered) are a solidfoundation for the future welfare of thecountry and its inhabitants if properlymanaged. We are working, for example,with Dracontium (Araceae), which hasseveral new species in Peru. Dracontium(also called jergon-sacha) is particularlyeffective in curing gastritis and stomachulcers and has antirheumatic propertiesand may improve Alzheimer’s disease. Itgrows in the humid parts of our local rainforests and is therefore a fine addition toforest-based frog and insect production.We produced a management manual forour farmers that explains a totallysustainable production process, whichmay be easily certified as “ecological”, butwhich also requires some post-harvestimprovements to ensure the final qualityof the product and avoid contamination.

The main problem of the Peruvianenterprises which are currently marketingfinal products of medicinal plant extractsis that they have no certification showinghow and where they get the primaryresources: by simple extraction (whichmay eliminate the resource in a fewmonths or years) or by real managementwith well-organized producer groups.

Failures in those primary steps ofproduction, harvesting and processingthe raw material may have fatal outcomessuch as the breakdown of the Bertholletianut production and export observed inBrazil. Once a country obtains a bad“contamination” report from one or moreNWFP products, it is very difficult to“clean” this negative image later, even ifthe problems can be resolved.

To access international markets withnew or known NWFP products we needat least a four-step certification process:



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1. Ecological production certification (maybe combined with the Certificate ofOrigin), which ensures that the resourceis managed at this locality or forest plotand will not become extinct (e.g. theBrazil nut) and the primary geneticresource or lineage will be maintained.(In commercial insect production, theshort life span of butterflies makes itimpossible to preserve the reproductorsover longer times – but we maymaintain the genetic lineage of abutterfly species in a project, so that itwill not become extinct.)

2. Chemical certification, which checksthat the product is free fromcontaminants (earth, sand, dangerousbacteria), dangerous pesticides orfungus-based aflatoxins.

3. Fair trade certification, which ensuresthat in commercializing this primaryproduct the usually poor producers willreceive a fair share of the incomesgenerated by trade in the product.

4. Rainforest Supermarket logo, an ideaproposed first by the World Wide Fundfor Nature (WWF)-Netherlands.Customers who purchase this productknow that they help to preserve tropicalrain forests and provide a better incometo the poorest farmers and nativecommunities. It will certify that thisproduct is a totally sustainably producedone without any impact on the originalgenetic resources of the country oforigin. This logo might be combined witha registered bar code, which identifiesthe producer group, production area,country and commercializing enterprise.Thus any problem with this productmight be traced instantly to the primaryproducer and the distributors (important,for example, if dangerous aflatoxins aredetected, indicating a wrong post-harvest management in a certainlocation).There are a few simple but very

important guidelines to make afunctioning ecological certificationprocess for any NWFP, whether flora orfauna. Today, for example, we know mostof the technology and methods toproduce frogs, reptiles, snakes (withsnake toxins), parrots, commercial

insects, aquarium fishes, medicinalplants, orchids, bromeliads and manyothers, in a totally sustainable way – theonly way to generate income with astanding forest to save it for the future.

Those basics are:1. The resource or product must be

managed in a totally sustainable way,without impacting on the primarygenetic resource. In the case of livingforest animals to be traded, the originalreproductors must stay in the country oforigin and, if possible, in the originalsite, and only juveniles produced froman artificially generated surplus shouldbe traded. In the case of plants such asCITES I Orchids, those can bemanaged by cloning or from seeds viaan in vitro laboratory.

2. The management process should notendanger other forest resources orimpact in such places: cutting a road or awide trail into the forest to collect seeds,palm fruits or nuts with a truck might besuch an impact or cutting down anaguaje palm (Mauritia flexuosa) to obtainthe palm fruits for export is another badexample. In forest animals, the “directcontingent catches” are harvestingmethods that are so unsustainable thatvaluable original reproductors are lost,as is observed today in Suriname andneighbouring countries.

3. The natural regeneration of theresource must be secured at all costs.For tree and palm products or medicinalplants, the long-term survival andrenewal of such tree stands and plantgrowths must be warranted. Inmanaged frogs, for example, we must

produce a certain excess percentage ofjuveniles to be returned to the forestafter having passed a programme torenew the original reproductor stock.Aguaje palms or fibre palms require acertain percentage of male plants inbetween female plant stands to ensurethe fertilization of the flowers. If we donot observe this we risk getting no fruitfrom the female palms.

4. For any given rain forest plot, we canevaluate and draw a product web,which is like a food web, but treats therelations of the present lumber andNWFP products coming from thisparticular lot and shows theirinterconnections and values. It canhappen that producing poison frogs in aforest plot provides more income thancutting the lumber out of this plot. If wecut a tree, for example, we will lose aunique ecosystem which has beengrowing a hundred years or more. Tore-establish the same ecosystem in thesame site where we felled this 25 mgiant tree will require thousands ofyears if we do not secure and take careof young trees of the same species inthe site. Usually, the first trees whichare felled are the giant seed-producingtrees. Therefore, correct lumbermanagement in tropical rain forests is avery difficult task and to designharvesting methods with the lowestimpact is not easy. If we know theproduct web, its interactions andvalues, we can estimate the damagewe cause by harvesting a tree and canadapt methods to replace the losthabitat or keep a sufficient number ofsimilar trees near by so that the speciescan migrate and survive – or we justavoid working with the lumber and gostraight to NWFP management.

5. The NWFP to be exported should havean added value in any case. In our frogbusiness, the frogs are raised aftermetamorphosis in glass cages or inspecial screened corrals, where weprovide additional food, sunlight, water,home plants and, before exporting, apreventive medication against the fatalchytrid fungus. In this way we add avalue to the frogs.



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6. Rain forest plots can be improvedartificially to attract species – this isespecially of interest if we run ecotouristprojects which always require a lot offauna around such sites. An artificiallycreated pond, for example, is a goodmagnet for attracting many differentanimals. Artificial tree cavities mightprovide shelter for forest birds, lizards,monkeys and so on. Frogs and fishesproduced in those artificial sites may bemanaged and exported, giving an extraincome to those projects. For example,in the lodges in Manu and Tambopata inPeru, artificial hollow palm stems areused for nesting sites by the Ara parrotswhich live totally free, feeding in theforest, but sleeping at the lodge andentertaining the tourists, thusconsiderably increasing visitor numbers.With rescued and raised Sanguinusmonkeys, forest pigs and capybarathere are similar models. This showsthat often the NWFP produced can bemore useful and cash providing in thesame site without even exporting it.

7. A problem concerning NWFPs fallingunder CITES I and II rules is themarking of the products. With parrotsand some bigger animals we can nowuse implanted codified microchips. Insmall animals such as our poison frogs,their individual pattern is registered bydigital photography and stored on a CDwhich accompanies the shipment. Inmedicinal plants or orchids obtainedfrom seeds or cloning we can use thebatch record from the in vitro laboratory.

8. Biopiracy is a major threat whenexporting NWFPs from developingcountries. Therefore, some countries,such as Brazil, are closing their frontiersto external enterprises that want tomake bioprospecting on native plants inthe Amazon. Brazil is making greatefforts to train national scientists and toconstruct advanced biochemicallaboratories at Manaus and elsewhere.The boom Brazil is enjoying at themoment in the “rain forest resourcecosmetics industry” [see CountryCompass for more information] is one ofthe results of trained local scientistsexploring and testing those resources.

But many poor countries with goodresources lack such infrastructure orscientists. In these cases, the onlysolution is to make joint ventures withexternal universities first, and then, afterfinding a promising product, fair tradecontracts can be made with commercialenterprises. It is also recommendedthat the external university constructinvestigation and bioprospectinglaboratories in the country of origin andestablish an exchange of scientists.This quickly provides trained specialistsin the country of origin, closing the“knowledge gap” between developedand developing countries. Locallytrained scientists are able to prescreenthe NWFP products in situ andexperiment with their management andproduction on site with localcommunities as producer groups,before a deeper screening is started atthe external university. There are manysmall, but highly specialized, externaluniversities which need to be linked tothe origins of such medicinal plants orpromising NWFPs. Funds for suchstrategies are available internationallyand locally. The problem is always tofind honest business partners.Germany, for example, issues “fairtrade” certificates nowadays for manyproducts coming from developingcountries. This must also be introducedfor “fair science” in order to makebioprospecting a really shared mission,where all partners win and no country oforigin will be the loser. We must makenew international rules and laws in thissense, which protect the property rightsof medicinal plants and other NWFPsfor the countries of origin – or we mustdelete worldwide any property rights orpatents on such resources and allowany interested individual, enterprise oruniversity to work freely with thosesubstances (unlikely in the current rushfor the best patent and highest profit).Therefore, such plants, resources orpatents must first be registered in thecountry of origin and patents or propertyrights established in the United Statesor Europe for plants from developingcountries should be invalidated. Our

organization also recommends thecreation of an international commissionto supervise fair trade, fair science,biopatenting and perhaps also providethe certifications. We must resolve these problems soon

as we have thousands of new NWFPproducts and medicinal plants waiting forexploration and commercializationworldwide which can improve the lives ofeveryone. We can also begin to breakdown the gap between developing anddeveloped country economies if we takecare of a fair bioprospecting, patentingand commercialization of NWFPs.(Contributed by: Dipl. Biol. RainerSchulte, International Consultant forNeotropical Fauna Management,INIBICO, Jr. Ramirez Hurtado 608,Tarapoto, San Martín, Peru; tel./fax: +5194 522618; e-mail: [email protected];www.geocities.com/inibico/)

CONGO BASINFOREST PARTNERSHIP

The Congo Basin Forest Partnership – a free association of public and privatepartners – is working to reduce povertyand improve the lives of the CongoBasin’s people through new and existingregional institutions and programmes byprotecting the region’s biodiversity andpromoting good governance and thesustainable use and management of itsforests and wildlife. (For moreinformation, please visit their Web site:www.cbfp.org/en/about.aspx)

CUPUAÇU CHOCOLATE

Scientists from the University of SãoPaulo, Brazil have patented a technologyto fabricate chocolate made from cupuaçu,replacing cacao. Six products have beendeveloped: three types of chocolate andthree chocolate powdered drinks.

According to Suzana Lannes, theresearcher responsible for the project, it isa refining of cupulate, the cupuaçuchocolate patented almost ten years agoby the Brazilian Company of Agribusiness



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Research (EMBRAPA) but nevercommercialized. “Cupulate is an oldproduct that required modifications to bemarketed,” she explained. “It melts veryeasily; it does not resist the heat.” The newtechnology alters the properties of the fatsfusion part of the cupuaçu, giving it moreconsistency.

The recipe is the same as forchocolate, except that cupuaçu is usedinstead of cacao. The flavour and thesmell are almost identical, but as anAmazonian fruit it offers the advantage ofbeing a native Brazilian product, with adecreased production cost.

Cupuaçu, which is related to theAmazonian cacao, has become a symbolin the struggle against biopiracy followingits registration by Asahi Foods in Japan.This patent, as well as that for cupulate,was removed by the JapaneseGovernment, but the company maintainsits patents for these products in Europe.(Source: Agência Estado, 13 April 2004[in Amazon News, 15 April 2004].)

DOMESTICATION OFNON-WOOD FORESTPRODUCTS: THETRANSITION FROMCOMMON PROPERTYRESOURCE TO CROP

The place of non-wood forest products insociety is changing. As the commonproperty resources of hunter-gatherersand subsistence farmers, these productsare of course central to the lives of manypeople for domestic use. Subsequently, asforest resources become scarce and aspeople move to urban centres foremployment in other activities, marketsdevelop for these products (see Figure).The agricultural revolution, especially inthe last 50 years, has, however, sidelinedthese forest products, labelling them of“minor” importance. Nevertheless, in manyplaces around the world, rural peopleknow the value of the species that providefor many of their daily needs formedicines, nutrition, fibres, gums and forother everyday products not provided bystaple food crops. Consequently, as the

forest receded, subsistence farmersinitiated their own silent revolution andstarted cultivating and domesticating theseuseful plants, many of which are trees.

Today, the forests are gone, but treesare increasingly found in farmland and,counterintuitively, especially in areas ofhigh human population density. A back-of-an-envelope calculation, which is difficult tosubstantiate, suggests that perhaps 1.52billion people (24 percent of the world’spopulation) use non-wood forest products.Possibly non-wood forest products are notso minor after all. Furthermore, becausemany of these are now cultivated on-farm(e.g. marula, Sclerocarya birrea; damar,Shorea javanica; shea nut, Vitellariaparadoxa; African plum, Dacryodesedulis), they need to be recognized asfarm produce in production statistics.Consequently, they have recently beenrenamed agroforestry tree products(AFTPs).

Recognizing the importance of non-wood tree products, agroforesters at theInternational Center for Research inAgroforestry initiated a DomesticationProgramme for Agroforestry Trees in 1995,building on principles and practicesdeveloped in the 1980s and elaborated atan international conference in 1992. Thisprogramme has made considerableprogress in several ecoregions of thetropics, developing a participatoryapproach, which is a politically and sociallyacceptable approach to biodiscovery that

empowers local communities to use andbenefit from their traditional knowledge.The process is based on thecharacterization of tree-to-treemorphological variation, physicochemicaland organoleptic properties of the treeproducts, with the objective of identifyingproduct “ideotypes”, which are targeted atspecific market opportunities.

This global initiative to domesticateindigenous trees producing AFTPs thatprovide food and nutritional security andmedicinal products also offersopportunities for subsistence farmers togenerate income for food, medicines,children’s school fees, agricultural inputssuch as fertilizers, and other daily needs.In this way it is seen as a means ofpromoting agroforestry and achieving theUN Millennium Development Goals.However, for this to become a reality, it isessential that domestication proceeds inparallel with market development (seeFigure). Ideally, this involves partnership inthe domestication process withcommercial companies. Interestingly,some multinational companies are nowentering partnerships of this sort andrecognizing agroforestry as a moreappropriate production system thanmonocultural plantations. However,increasing commercialization raises a newproblem, which is how to commercializewithout undermining traditional and culturalvalues, and without exploiting thetraditional knowledge of local communities.

THE DOMESTICATION AND THE COMMERCIALIZATION CONTINUUM


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The participatory domestication processputs communities in a position to protecttheir intellectual property rights by, forexample, the registration of PlantBreeders’ Rights, but in most countries thelegal process is expensive, bureaucraticand inappropriate for farmers and ruralcommunities. Resolving this issue isrecognized as an urgent priority, butprogress is slow. Another constraint toachieving the scale of AFTP domesticationand commercialization needed to achievethe Millennium Development Goals by2015 is the lack of people with treedomestication skills in rural communities,especially for techniques such asvegetative propagation. Together, theseopportunities and constraints indicate theneed for greater recognition of the valueand potential of non-wood forest productsas new agricultural commodities (AFTPs).To this end, some policy guidelines havebeen published (Wynberg et al., 2003;Tchoundjeu et al., 2004; Ndoye et al., 2004[see Publications of Interest]).(Contributed by: Roger R.B. Leakey,Agroforestry and Novel Crops Unit, Schoolof Tropical Biology, James CookUniversity, Cairns, QLD 4870, Australia; e-mail: [email protected])

FORESTS AND HEALTH

Traditional medicines have “real benefits”Scientists have shown that traditionalmedicines used in parts of Africa andAsia could help treat major diseasessuch as cancer and diabetes. They saytheir findings could lead to theidentification of new compounds for usein drug manufacture.

Researchers at King’s College Londonshowed that extracts from India’s curryleaf tree can regulate the release ofglucose into the bloodstream, whichcould help diabetics who lack sufficientinsulin to cope with excessive bloodsugar. An extract of the climbingdayflower – used by traditional healers inGhana – turned out be both antibacterialand antifungal; an aquatic weed fromThailand and the Chinese star anise bothinhibited the growth of cancer cells.

Any compounds identified from theseplants will need to be investigated furtherwith full clinical trials to confirm theseinitial results, say complementarymedicine experts. (Source: BBC Online[in SciDev.Net Weekly Update, 27September–3 October 2004].)

Jungle medicine has already cured 800 diseases Two scientific investigations carried outrecently in Pará and São Paulo states(Brazil) show how 800 health problemsare treated in Amazonia, using almost 1 800 animals and plants. The researchwas carried out by the Museum of EmilioGoeldi Ethnology Department and theSão Paulo School of Medicine.

The researchers went to 18 localities ineight Pará state municipalities, wherethey identified 200 diseases treated withso-called “popular recipes”. Theyinterviewed 65 curandeiros and identified23 mammals, ten birds, eight types ofreptile, fish and 15 invertebrates, inaddition to 500 plants used in theremedies. Of the 1 800 investigated, 30are of indigenous origin, 25 percent camefrom Africa and the rest were of variedorigin.

A reason why cures with traditionalmedicines continue to be marginalized isalso because international laboratorieswant to continue earning billions ofdollars through biopiracy, practised intropical forests worldwide. By robbingherbs and plants and the knowledge oftraditional populations, these laboratoriesearn millions of dollars when their newproducts are introduced into the market.(Source: Página 20, 10 September 2004[in Amazon News, 16 September 2004].)

Sustaining the supply of traditionalmedicines (DFID Forestry ResearchProgramme R8305) This document is an output from a projectfunded by the United KingdomDepartment for International Development(DFID) for the benefit of developingcountries.The views expressed are notnecessarily those of DFID.

In Africa, livelihoods, health and naturalresources are intimately entwined, mostobviously through the collection, tradeand use of medicinal plants. Traditionalmedicine which relies on nativetherapeutic plants is reportedly used byup to 80 percent of people in sub-Saharan Africa and is often the onlysource of health care for the poorest andthe most isolated rural people. Theadvent of HIV/AIDS has increaseddemand for medicinal plants to alleviatethe symptoms of AIDS. Demand formedicinal plants from urban populationshas resulted in high levels of commercialharvesting which is often concentrated inforest reserves which are increasingly theonly remaining habitat for significantpopulations of indigenous plants.Unsustainable harvesting of these plantsthreatens the species themselves, theincome security of collectors and couldcompromise the health security of urbanand rural poor people. Nevertheless, thesustainability of locally used medicinalspecies has been largely disregarded bynatural resource managers, trade is aninvisible part of the grey economy andexploitation is often illegal. This meansthat the impending medicinal plant crisishas been largely overlooked by theinternational research and aidcommunities.

The R8305 project is intended to helpredress this imbalance within theSouthern African DevelopmentCommunity region with South Africa,Malawi and Zambia as project partnercountries. The project focuses on thedevelopment of scientific andcollaborative tools to prepare sustainedyield management plans for medicinaltree bark which forms up to 40 percent ofthe plant products traded wholesale in

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South Africa. The project is a successorto the South African Innovation Fund“Commercial products from the wild”project which has also worked on barkand it seeks to extend the findings of thisproject to other species, ecosystems andcountries in southern Africa.

Over the past five years, the ForestryResearch Programme has supported thedevelopment of management systems fornon-timber forest products (NTFPs). Partof this support was the identification of aneed for better focused research onbiometric sampling to determine thestocking and growth of NTFPs (ZF0192and ZF0077). Several case studies ofNTFP inventory methods wereundertaken by the European Union-funded FAO GCP/RAF/354/EC project“Sustainable forest management inAfrican ACP countries” [see Non-WoodNews No. 9 ] and the present projectbuilds on this experience and therelationships established between SouthAfrican, Malawian and Zambianresearchers. Technical backstopping forthe project comes from United Kingdomand German universities.

The preliminary findings of R8305 arethat tree species respond in differentways to the stresses of bark removal andnot all can replace lost bark or evensurvive such wounding. This means thatit is necessary to customize managementplans for each species of tree beingmanaged for bark. The project isdeveloping the protocols by which thiscan be done in a form suitable for use byForestry Department field staff workingtogether with local bark collectors – as abark management “toolkit”. Themanagement plans that will be facilitatedby the trained Forestry Department staffshould lead to a sustainable supply ofbark which in turn should provide a soundand secure basis for collectors’ andtraders’ incomes as well as contributingto health security.

The intention is that the toolkit will beadopted for use within the context of therecently introduced collaborative forestmanagement principles in each country.This process is supported by bilateralprojects in those countries, which means

implementation can be supported. Thiswill be supported by training materialsand courses to be delivered by forestrycolleges in each country. Academicpapers will relay the findings of theproject to the international forestryresearch community and by peer reviewincrease their credibility. Capacitybuilding within the research, educationand forestry organizations involved in theproject and the development of aninternational network of NTFPresearchers are also important outputs ofthis project.

A project workshop will take place inJohannesburg, South Africa, in October2005.


Dr Jenny Wong, Ynys Uchaf, Mynydd

Llandegai, Bangor, Gwynedd, LL57

4BZ, UK.


www.wildresources.co.uk/projects_mal

awi.shtml

Forests, safety nets for HIV/AIDS-affectedhouseholdsForests provide emergency income, foodand medicine for rural householdsaffected by HIV/AIDS.

Households affected by HIV/AIDS relyon forest resources such as fuelwood,medicinal plants and wild foods forincome and food, according to a recentstudy commissioned by FAO in fivecommunities in Malawi and Mozambique.

Households experiencing the loss ofan HIV/AIDS-affected working-age adult

are five times more likely to haveincreased fuelwood collection, the studyreports. Because fuelwood can becollected with minimal and unspecializedcapital input, robust markets for fuelwoodprovide affected households with a year-round opportunity to generate cash.

Sixty percent of affected householdsalso relied on the use of medicinal plantsas a primary response to illness. Herbalremedies have been observed to beeffective in managing HIV/AIDS-relatedinfections such as oral thrush, herpes andshingles, and in relieving appetite loss,nausea, fever, diarrhoea and cough.

Nearly a quarter of the householdssuffering the recent death of a working-age adult stated that the sale andconsumption of medicinal plants, wildfoods and other products such as reedmats and baskets, had become a moreimportant source of income and foodfollowing the loss, with some householdsentering such activities for the first time.They were also twice as likely to havehad a major forest products collection tripin the previous month.

Where forests provide a safety net forrural households coping with the short-and long-term impacts of HIV/AIDS,inadequate forest management isthreatening the viability of these copingstrategies.

Indicators of forest quality in twoaffected communities with similar accessto forest resources revealed that in thecommunity with a high level of HIVprevalence, forest resources were beingdepleted at a faster rate.

This is not to say that there is a causalrelationship between HIV prevalence anddeforestation, but this research doesindicate that, for households in thoserural communities most affected byHIV/AIDS, their ability to cope with theepidemic is undermined if forestresources are depleted.

The availability of medicinal plants usedin the treatment of HIV/AIDS-relatedillnesses also decreased in affectedcommunities. According to local herbalists,at least 13 species used in treating one ormore of these illnesses have decreased inavailability over the last five years.


FAO studies in Malawi and Mozambiqueindicate that the sustainable managementof forest resources is a mitigation strategyin itself. The loss of forest resources notonly undermines rural coping strategies,but aggravates the labour burdens ofhouseholds constrained by sickness andcare-giving. In addition to the healthconsequences at the household level,scarcity of forest resources for subsistencecan create situations of vulnerability thatperpetuate the epidemic in rural areas.

The lines between health and theenvironment are not distinct. It isnecessary that responses to the HIV/AIDScrisis comprehensively address therealities of the affected rural communities.

FAO recognizes that empowering localinstitutions is key to building andmaintaining local resilience in HIV/AIDSprevention, care and impact mitigation. It isfacilitating national forestry departments tointegrate HIV/AIDS-coping strategies intotheir programming.

FAO recommends policy and fieldprogramme implementation that ensuresaffordability, quality, sustainablemanagement, domestication and use ofmedicinal plants; improved accessibilityand availability of fuelwood; subsistencecollection and domestication of nutritionallyvaluable foods for dietary diversificationwith an emphasis on micronutrient intake;and developing low-capital, income-generating activities from forests. (Anonline discussion-forum on the topic maybe found at: www.fao.org/forestry/foris/webview/forestry2/index.jsp?siteId=3561&sitetreeId=21328&langId=1&geoId=0)


Christine Holding Anyonge, Forestry

Officer (Extension), Forestry Policy

and Information Division, FAO.

E-mail:

[email protected]

Traditional medicines “must be registeredand studied”A World Health Organization official hasurged traditional medicine practitioners inAfrica to register their products to gainmore benefits – including internationaltrade – from their use. Speaking on

16 August at the first scientific meeting of the Western Africa Network of NaturalProducts Research Scientists, whichfocused on malaria and HIV/AIDS,Charles Wambebe said that only 22 of 46African countries have policies or lawscovering traditional medicine.

Wambebe said that traditionalmedicine was the most accessible form oftreatment for most Africans, andunderlined the need for morecomplementary use of traditional andmodern medicine practices to meet thehealth needs of the majority. He alsostressed the importance of research andconservation of medicinal plants toensure their sustainable use.

The network’s executive secretary wasconcerned that local pharmacists preferto import foreign drugs rather thanprepare traditional treatments,commenting that medicinal plants wouldbe used more effectively and rationallyand would have greater value if morewere known about their scientific basis.(Source: GhanaWeb.Com [in SciDev.NetWeekly Update, 16–22 August 2004].)

Support for traditional medicine from African statesA number of African leaders last weekused the second African TraditionalMedicine Day (31 August) to confirm theircommitment to national efforts aimed atensuring the safety, efficacy and qualityof traditional medicines. The AfricanUnion Commission called on its memberstates to ensure that research ontraditional medicine is integrated withHIV/AIDS control programmes, as well aswith all aspects of development policy.

Similarly, the newly establishedministerial committee on traditionalmedicine of the Southern AfricanDevelopment Community stressed theimportance of traditional medicine inaddressing health challenges.

Since 2001, when the Summit of theOrganization of African Unity declared2001–2010 as the Decade for AfricanTraditional Medicine, African countrieshave been developing both researchprogrammes on traditional remedies andlegislation regulating their use.

South Africa, for example, has set up aTraditional Medicines Database containingmedical and botanical information onplants with healing properties, intended asa step towards setting safety standards.Earlier this year, the country’s MedicalResearch Council started investigatingseven traditional remedies to determinewhether anecdotal claims of cures forseveral diseases – including HIV/AIDS –can be supported scientifically.

African countries, such as the UnitedRepublic of Tanzania, already havelegislation regulating the use of traditionalmedicine.

The South African Parliament isexpected to follow suit with the adoptionof a bill setting up a Traditional HealthPractitioners Council, as well as aregulatory framework for traditional healthpractitioners and services. This proposalhas run into criticism from organizationssuch as Doctors For Life, who oppose theuse of medicines that, they claim, havenot been scientifically validated.

In Kenya, however, a similar bill hasbeen given a cautious welcome by themedical community, even thoughphysicians continue to expressreservations about the ethical basis onwhich some traditional medicines areadministered. [See next story.]

Ghana has launched a code of ethicsfor traditional medicine practitioners,developed by the Ghana Federation ofTraditional Medicine PractitionersAssociations.

In Senegal, it was announced that thefourth International Conference onTraditional Medicine will have a particularfocus on HIV/AIDS. (Source: SciDev.Net,3 September 2004.)


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Hypericum perforatum



26

Traditional medicine action plan in Kenya Kenya is to develop a national strategyfor both promoting and regulating the useof traditional medicine, and providingalternative forms of treatment to thecountry’s poor. The new arrangement willboost research into the use of bothtraditional knowledge and modernmedicines to curb major diseases suchas HIV/AIDS and malaria. It will alsoencourage the conservation of biologicalresources from which traditionalmedicines are drawn.

Kenya’s Environment Ministersuggested that increased research intodeveloping traditional medicines for thepoor could be used to encouragecommunities to conserve biologicaldiversity. For example, he emphasizedthe need to preserve one of the mostendangered tree species, Prunusafricana, whose bark contains medicinalcompounds. Kenya has already bannedthe tree’s export in order to protect it.(Source: SciDev.Net Weekly Update, 28June–4 July 2004.)

Centre of forestry health To preserve the knowledge of traditionalcommunities that utilize forest resources tocombat their diseases in an ecological andsustainable manner is the objective of theNew Life Health Project in Rio Branco–AC(Brazil). The idea is to form nuclei togetherwith the state’s traditional communities in adistinct manner to guarantee thepreservation of people’s health from theresources that are available in the forest.

“We all know that diseases such asmalaria are treated with a tea of ten herbsthat produces a cure as good as or betterthan the remedies from the pharmacy. Wealso have cures for parasites, rheumatism,stomach aches, skin problems and manymore. All of these medications are at ourreach in the forest in the areassurrounding where we live, we need toknow how to use them in an appropriateway,” affirms the director of the New LifeHealth Project.

In the health centres, the patients willnot only receive conventional medicationsbut also teas and other productselaborated with herbs and traditional

techniques. “In Croa we have 30 studentswho are dedicated to recuperating thisculture that circulates within thecommunity. We have more than 60different types of traditional medicineready to be tested and studied in the hopeof being able to produce health as well asresources for the people of the forest.”

The Centre of Forestry Medicine willfunction as a great formation centre forprofessionals who will then join theircommunities in the middle of the forest.Among them are health promoters offorestry medicine and environmentaleducation. (Source: Página 20, 26 March2004 [in Amazon News, 1 April 2004].)

INSECT ATTACKSEUCALYPTUS

The now popular hybrid eucalyptus treefaces destruction in Kenya by the bluegum chalcid, an insect in the bee-waspfamily that invaded the country fromUganda. Scientists estimate that about40 percent of Kenya’s forests could bedestroyed. Eucalyptus trees form thesingle biggest family of plantation speciesin Kenya’s forestry.

Kenya has yet to come up with asolution to counter the destructive insect.However, trials are under way tointroduce a biological control.

There are more than 800 species ofEucalyptus worldwide, with Kenyahosting some 600 of them. Wherescientific evaluations are done in anexercise called species-site matching, thetree can be used to support localbiodiversity. The sunbirds and manyinsects, for example, find eucalyptusforests a very conducive home owing toplenty of food in the form of flower nectar.

The tea and tobacco industries find itten times cheaper to cure their leavesusing eucalyptus fuelwood in theirfurnaces compared with fuel oil.

Eucalyptus is also widely used in thepharmaceutical industry, especially inmaking nose-unblocking sticks and skin-rubbing ointments. Sweets, toothpastesand confectioneries are also blended witheucalyptus oil for flavour.

Honey made by bees feeding oneucalyptus flowers is also recognized asone of the best in the world. As a result,Australia is a leading honey producer.(Source: The Nation [Nairobi], 18November 2004].)

MANGROVEACTION PROJECT

Naturally resilient, mangrove forests have withstood severe storms andchanging tides for many millennia, but theyare now being devastated by modernencroachments. Today, mangrove forestsare among the most threatened habitats inthe world – disappearing at an acceleratingrate, yet with little public notice.

Today, less than half the world’s originalmangrove forest cover remains. There aremany reasons for this decline, but ingeneral the blame lies with unregulatedand unsustainable developments, lack ofclear understanding and recognition of theimportance of mangrove wetlands, and aclear lack of law enforcement andmonitoring to protect these fragileecosystems from illegal encroachment.Nearly one million hectares of coastalareas, including valuable mangroveforests, have been cleared to make wayfor the shrimp aquaculture industry. Otherunsustainable developments, such astimber and oil extraction, the charcoal andtourism industries, and unchecked urbanexpansion along the tropical and sub-tropical coasts, are also contributing toextensive tidal wetland losses worldwide.

To address these critical issueseffectively, the Mangrove Action Projecthas taken a dynamically unique five-pronged approach to long-term mangroveconservation: education/awareness


27


raising; collaboration; restoration;conservation; and advocacy.

The Mangrove Action Project (MAP), inpartnership with several Caribbean non-governmental organizations, is currentlyworking towards a programme to restoredegraded mangrove forests in theCaribbean region. This programme canserve as a demonstration project for otherrestoration efforts worldwide. MAP willtrain a group of restoration experts to

MINILIVESTOCK

Minilivestock use implicationsAlthough there are more than 15 million species of plants, animals andmicrobes on earth, more than 90 percent of the world’s food supply comes from just 15 crop species andeight livestock species.

One way to augment the human foodsupply is to increase the diversity of plantand animal species used as food. Arecent book provides stimulating andtimely suggestions about expanding theworld food supply to include a variety ofminilivestock. It suggests a wide varietyof small animals as nutritious food. Theseanimals include insects, earthworms,snails, frogs and various rodents.

The major advantage of minilivestock isthat they do not have to be fed on grains,thus saving many crop species for humanconsumption. The book suggeststechnologies for harvesting these smalllivestock. (Source: Paoletti, Maurizio G.,ed. 2004. Ecological implications of the useof minilivestock (insects, rodents, frogs andsnails). Science Publishers, Inc., USA.)


Maurizio G. Paoletti, Dipartimento di

Biologia, Università di Padova,

Padova, Italy.


www.bio.unipd.it/agroecology/

investigate several sites throughout theCaribbean and select suitable locations forthe restoration programme.

MAP has successfully led small-scale,international volunteer teams on work/ecostudy tours in Ecuador, Thailand,Malaysia and Sri Lanka. These tourshave raised public awareness locally aswell as internationally on the importanceof mangrove forests for both marine lifeand local communities.


Alfredo Quarto, Executive Director,

Mangrove Action Project,

PO Box 1854, Port Angeles,

WA 98362-0279, USA.

Tel./fax: +1 360 452 5866;

e-mail: [email protected];

www.earthisland.org/map/map.html

[Please also see Mangroves and the

tsunami, on page 69.]

Mangroves are rain forests by the sea.The majority of the subtropical andtropical coastline is dominated bymangroves, estimated to cover anarea of 22 million hectares.However, over the past severaldecades, the global area in mangroveshas increasingly diminished as aresult of a variety of human activities.

Mangrove forests comprisetaxonomically diverse, salt-toleranttree and other plant species whichthrive in intertidal zones of shelteredtropical shores, “overwash” islandsand estuaries. Mangrove trees havespecially adapted aerial and salt-filtering roots and salt-excretingleaves that enable them to occupy thesaline wetlands where other plant lifecannot survive.

Mangrove ecosystems havetraditionally been sustainablymanaged by local populations for theproduction of food, medicines,tannins, fuelwood and constructionmaterials. For millions of indigenouscoastal residents, mangrove forestsoffer dependable, basic livelihoodsand sustain their traditional cultures.

The protective mangrove bufferzone helps minimize damage of

property and losses of life fromhurricanes and storms. In regionswhere these coastal fringe forestshave been cleared, tremendousproblems of erosion and siltation havearisen, and sometimes terrible lossesto human life and property haveoccurred owing to destructive storms.Mangroves have also been useful intreating effluent, as the plants absorbexcess nitrates and phosphates,thereby preventing the contaminationof nearshore waters.

The shallow intertidal reaches thatcharacterize the mangrove wetlandsoffer refuge and nursery grounds forjuvenile fish, crabs, shrimps andmolluscs. Mangroves are also primenesting and migratory sites forhundreds of bird species. In Belize, forinstance, there are more than 500species of birds recorded in mangroveareas. Additionally, manatees, crab-eating monkeys, fishing cats, monitorlizards, sea turtles, the Royal Bengaltigers and mud-skipper fish utilize themangrove wetlands. Many endangeredspecies are native to mangroves.

Mangrove forests literally live in twoworlds at once, acting as the interfacebetween land and sea.

MANGROVE FORESTS


Insects are essential sources ofproteins, fats and important vitaminsin many parts of the world. Forexample,100 grams of termites canprovide more than 500 calories offood energy, while bee larvae containten times as much vitamin A as eggyolk does. (Source: Elevitch, Craig R.,ed. 2004. The Overstory Book:cultivating connections with trees.Permanent Agriculture Resources,Holualoa, Hawaii, USA.)

Gecko breeding expansion in Viet NamThe Non-timber Forest ProductsSubsector Support Project in Viet Nam isgoing to support target villagers in theproject area of Van Don district, QuangNinh province to establish and test twodifferent gecko breeding models, anddisseminate lessons learned throughoutthe country to improve household incomegeneration and forest protection.

Geckos belong to the reptile family ofGekkonidae, and are known to occurthroughout Viet Nam. In their naturalhabitat geckos live typically in forests at

Contribution des insectes de la forêt àla sécurité alimentaire. L’exemple deschenilles d’Afrique centrale (Contributionof forest insects to food security.Theexample of caterpillars in CentralAfrica) is a new working document fromFAO’s Non-Wood Forest ProductsProgramme.The document is in French,but the synthesis is also in English.

Hard copies are available free ofcharge from: Non-Wood ForestProducts Programme, Forest Productsand Economics Division, ForestryDepartment, FAO.Fax: +39 0657055137;e-mail: [email protected];online version: www.fao.org/docrep/007/j3463f/j3463f00.htm

elevations of less than 900 m. Geckosare commonly used as a remedy intraditional Chinese medicine;consequently, there is a huge demand forthe species which continuously threatenswild populations. In addition, the currentmethod of collection and harvesting ofgeckos is destructive because thegeckos’ habitat (old trees) is usuallydestroyed through chopping the treesand collecting the animals.

In theory, gecko breeding is not verylabour intensive, which could bebeneficial to several households of themost disadvantaged groups of the localcommunity and, to some extent, of thewhole country. Gecko breeding modelswere successfully introduced by an FAOproject in Hoanh Bo district. However, forsome reason the models have not beenpromoted outside the area. By testing themodels in Van Don, a differentgeographic area, the NTFP project hopesto: meet the interest of local farmers ingecko breeding, thus decreasing the levelof uncontrolled exploitation of wildpopulations in natural forests; and gatheruseful experience to expand the practicebeyond the project field sites.

The project will subsidize 80 to 90percent of the total costs for cages andbreeding stock. According to projectestimates, the two models will yieldprofits of up to D 350 000 after tenmonths of implementation and, sinceproduction costs for the second cycle arelower, net profits will increase by aroundD 200 000 in the subsequent productioncycles.


Ms Pham Thi Thuy Ha, NTFP project

Northern Field Station Manager.


or

Mrs Nguyen Thi Bich Hue,

Communications Officer, Non-timber

Forest Products Subsector Support

Project, 8 Chuong Duong Do Street,

Hoan Kiem, Hanoi, Viet Nam.

Fax: +84 4 9320 996;

e-mail: [email protected] or

[email protected]

www.ntfp.org.vn

Bureau for Exchange and Distribution of Information on Mini-LivestockThe Bureau for Exchange andDistribution of Information on Mini-Livestock (BEDIM) has been activeworldwide for many years in thecontrolled development of minilivestock,i.e. African and South Americangrasscutters, guinea pigs, frogs, giantsnails, termites, butterflies, capybarasand other rodents.

BEDIM produces and publishes aSemestral Information Bulletin on Mini-Livestock with the financial support of theFAO Animal Production and HealthDivision.


BEDIM Secrétariat, Unité de zoologie

fondamentale et appliquée,

Faculté universitaire des

sciences agronomiques,

Passage des déportés 2,

B-5030 Gembloux, Belgium.

Fax: +32 81 622312;


www.fao.org/ag/AGa/AGAP/FRG/FEED

back/War/W6437t/w6437t10.htm

The frog population in Russia isdangerously reduced because theChinese food market isoverconsuming them. (Source: TaigaRescue Network.)


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ORGANICALLY CERTIFIEDNWFPS – HARVESTINGWILD AND SEMI-DOMESTICATED SPECIES

As an outgrowth of the expandingmarket for organic food products,mechanisms are being developed tocertify organically produced NWFPs.

Organic certification of NWFPs is stillembryonic compared with the cultivatedproducts that are the main focus ofexisting organic production systems.However, many organic standardsprovide specific sections on NWFPs,such as the International Federation ofOrganic Agriculture Movements (IFOAM)Basic standards for organic productionand processing.

Organic certification promoteseconomically viable and environmentallyfriendly use of natural resources. Thecertification mechanisms that alreadyexist for monitoring and evaluatingproduction or commercialization ofagriculture and timber products can beexpanded and adapted for certifyingorganic NWFPs.

Four main certification schemes arerelevant to NWFPs:

• Organic certification focuses oncriteria such as the renunciation ofsynthetic fertilizers and pesticides.Under these criteria, wild and semi-domesticated NWFPs such aspinenuts, mushrooms and herbscould be considered organic.

• Forest management certificationassesses the ecological aspects ofresource management, both at the

forest and species or product level,and ensures the sustainableproduction of forest resources.

• Social certification, such as fair andethical trade, assures that labourconditions are acceptable andbenefits are shared equally amongthose involved in production andtrade.

• Product quality certification coversproduction standards that focus onthe product as well as on the way it isprocessed and manufactured.

Organic systems are based on precise standards of production that work towards supporting optimal agro-ecosystems. In order to be recognized as organic products, wild harvested orsemi-domesticated products should meet explicit criteria. (Source: Fact sheet,FAO Inter-Departmental Working Groupon Organic Agriculture, www.fao.org/organicag/)

ORGANIC PRODUCERSAND ASSOCIATION OFZAMBIA

Honey production from the North-Western Province of Zambia hasincreased with an estimated export cropof 400 tonnes involving 3 000 bark hiveproducers in the 2003/04 season.According to the Organic Producers andAssociation of Zambia (OPPAZ), the lastfew years have seen numeroussuccesses in the organic field with someof the honey producers being certified bythe Soil Association of Zambia under theumbrella of the North-WesternBeekeepers Association. Organiccertification is carried out by Ecocert, aFrench certification body.

OPPAZ says that commercialagriculture has been producing certifiedorganic vegetables for export and is nowbeginning to export essential oils usingthe outgrower schemes.

There is a growing interest inorganically wild products such as manjeti(mongongo) nut oil, baobab oil and fruit,marula oil and mpundu (Parinariumcuratellifolia) nut oil.

Organically certified wild harvestmushrooms have been exported fromMpongwe for a number of years,according to OPPAZ. (Source: The Timesof Zambia [Ndola], 10 March 2004.)

OUTLOOK STUDIES

Less natural forest cover, but moreprotected areas and forest plantations,and an increased share of internationaltrade in forest products are expected by2020 in Latin America and the Caribbean.This is the conclusion of an outlook studyto be published at the end of the year byFAO. The forecasts were presented fordiscussion to country representatives atthe Latin American and CaribbeanForestry Commission this week [October2004] in San José, Costa Rica.

Country representatives at the meetingrecognized the need for coordinatedfollow-up actions and programmes inresponse to the outlook forecasts. “Thefuture of forests in the region in the comingdecades depends on how countries reactto, and what kinds of actions they take inview of these expected changes,” said MrMerilio Morell, an FAO forestry expert, atthe meeting.

Natural forest cover is expected tocontinue decreasing between now and2020, according to the study. It isexpected to shrink from 964 millionhectares in 2002 to 887 million hectaresin 2020, or 47 percent of the total landarea of the region. Planted forests areforecast to increase from 12 million tomore than 16 million hectares. Protectedareas are also likely to expand. Between1950 and 2003, protected areas hadalready increased from 17.5 million to397 million hectares, reaching 19 percentof the region’s total area and 23 percentof the world’s protected areas. Between


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30

now and 2020, new protected areas areexpected to be created in the region,including mega-parks and biologicalcorridors.

With appropriate means, it is possibleto reverse the trend of deforestation.

Costa Rica reported how forest coverin the country increased from less than30 percent to 47 percent in little morethan a decade thanks to its National Fundfor Forest Financing. The fund spends3.5 percent in tax charged for the use offossil fuels to support landowners andlocal communities in maintainingprotected areas, planting trees andmanaging their natural resources.

Uruguay and Cuba also described howtheir policies helped slow down andreverse the deforestation rate.

“To guarantee protection andsustainable use of forests, the multiplebenefits and services provided by forestshave to be valuated in monetary terms bythose who benefit,” Morell said. “Forestsnot only offer timber and non-wood forestproducts such as fruits and naturalmedicines, but also contribute toecotourism, the conservation ofwatersheds and biodiversity, and to themitigation of climate change. All this shouldbe valuated to raise funds needed to payfor the conservation of forests.” (Source:FAO Newsroom, 20 October 2004.)[See page 71 for more information onoutlook studies.]

PLANT AND CLAY DYES

The plants used by weavers and pottersin West Bengal, India, for extractingnatural dye include Acacia catechu(heartwood), Albizia lebbeck (fruit), Buteamonosperma (flowers), Camellia sinensis(leaves), Ceriops decandra (bark),Ceriops tagal (bark), Citrus aurantifolia(juice mixed with palash), Daucus carota(roots), Mimusops elengi (bark), Punicagranatum (fruit rind), Rhizophoraapiculata (bark), Rhizophora mucronata(bark), Rhizophora stylosa (bark),Swietenia mahagoni (fruit), Tageteserecta (flower), Ziziphus jujuba (ash oftwig) and Ziziphus oenoplia (ash of twig).

Diospyros peregrina fruit extract issmeared on thread to increase itslongevity and the bark extract ofMimusops elengi is used in textiles toincrease the lustre. (Source: Ghosh, A.2004. Plant and clay dyes used byweavers and potters in West Bengal.Natural Product Radiance, 3[2]: 91.)

PLANT MORE TREES

FAO advised countries in the Near Eastand North Africa to plant more trees toimprove the quality of water and increasefood production.

In a statement coinciding with the startof a five-day meeting of experts in theLebanese capital, Beirut, Hosny al-Lakany,FAO Assistant Director-General forForestry, said that “planted trees not onlyhelp the region to have better quality water,but trees serve as windbreaks andshelterbelts against desertification.”

Forest cover in the region amounts toaround 110 million hectares, equivalent to5.9 percent of the total land area. But theSudan accounts for more than half the totalforested area and in other countries forestson average cover less than 3 percent ofthe land.

The overall forest cover in the regiondeclined by nearly 1 million hectares ayear in the last decade and six countriesrecorded a drop in forest cover.

FAO estimates that about 8.3 millionhectares, around 5.5 percent of the totalforested area in the Near East, consist oftrees which have been planted, and thatalmost half of them are in Iran or Turkey.

The statement noted that forests areimportant as a source of fuel and livestockfodder. Forests in the region also provideabout 2 million cubic metres of woodproducts and more than US$100 million

worth of exported non-wood forestproducts, such as gum arabic, cork,pistachios and honey. (Source:The DailyStar [Lebanon], 25 May 2004.)

PONGAMIA PINNATA OIL

Pongamia pinnata produces seedscontaining 30 to 40 percent of oil. Thisnatural pongamia oil is being substitutedfor petroleum diesel oil in local powergenerators in Powerguda village,Adilabad district, Andhra Pradesh, India,thereby reducing carbon dioxideemissions.

The carbon dioxide emission reductioncomes from the substitution of about 51tonnes of diesel oil by biofuel producedfrom Pongamia pinnata, a native treespecies found in the local forest. Thepeople of Powerguda planted 4 500pongamia trees in 2002 on the edges oftheir agricultural land. Oil from thepongamia seeds is extracted in thevillage’s oil mill which was installed by alocal government agency.

The World Bank’s ESSD Forest Teamhas recently purchased the equivalent of147 tonnes of carbon dioxide in verifiedemission reductions from Powergudavillage. The emission reductions over tenyears come from the production of thisnatural pongamia oil which is substitutingpetroleum diesel for use in powergenerators and other engines. A Certificateof Recognition of Global EnvironmentalLeadership has been given to the WorldBank to confirm their purchase.

For more information, please see:

www.profor.info/pdf/PowergudaCertific

ate.pdf; and

www.profor.info/docs/PressReleasePo

werguda.doc


PROBONA

The Programa Regional de BosquesNativos Andinos (PROBONA) works withnon-wood forest products: food products,such as the Andean honey bee, cheese,fishery, organic coffee and Andean fruits,as well as with non-food products, suchas leaves (Blechnum sp.), natural fibre(cabuya), duda (Aulonemia queko) andLatin bamboo (caña guadua). Theirobjective is to raise awareness andincrease knowledge concerning theseproducts and those who produce them,and to create markets for them.


Ing. Karina Lalama, Programa de

Bosques Nativos Andinos (PROBONA),

PO Box 17-11-6142, Quito, Ecuador.

Tel./fax: +593 2 2295259;

e-mail: [email protected]

PROJET D’APPUITECHNIQUE À LA FILIÈREKARITÉ (PROKARITÉ)

An initiative of the World AgroforestryCentre (ICRAF-Sahel) with support fromthe Common Fund for Commodities,FAO and the Government of theNetherlands, the Projet d’appuitechnique à la filière Karité (ProKarité) isa concerted regional, technical andcommercial programme for thedevelopment of the shea resource toserve all the stakeholders of the sheasector, from rural producer communitiesto urban and international end users,including both industry and consumers.

The product certification systemestablished under ProKarité will enhancethe “traceability” of the regional supplychain, thus serving all sector stakeholders.

ProKarité will reinforce the value of theliving tree, for the primary benefit of theproducers who manage the shea standsacross the African continent, theirhouseholds and future generations.


Eliot Masters, ProKarité Project

Coordinator, c/o ICRAF-Sahel, BP 320

Bamako, Mali.

Fax: +223 222 8683;


www.prokarite.org/index-eng.html;

www.thesheanetwork.net/

SUDAN SILVA

Sudan Silva is a specialized journalpublished biannually by the SudaneseForestry Society and the ForestsNational Corporation. It publishesoriginal research and critical reviews inall areas of forestry and related fields.


Editor-in-Chief, Sudan Silva, Forests

National Corporation, PO Box 658,

Khartoum, the Sudan.

Fax: +249 11 472659;

e-mail: [email protected]

TAIGA NON-TIMBERFOREST PRODUCTS

An NTFP workshop, held during theTaiga Rescue Network 7th BiennialMeeting, took place on 21 September2004 in Vladivostok, Russian Federation.The major outcomes of the sessionwere:

• Nature tourism will reduce loggingand save NTFPs.

• Growing medicinal plants for sale willprotect wild plants.

• Need to protect NTFPs fromoverharvesting for profit.

• Wild plants are needed for medicinaland spiritual practices.

• Map critical areas of NTFPs forgovernment land-use planning andprotection from logging.


Damien Lee, Information Coordinator,

Taiga Rescue Network, Box 116, 96223

Jokkmokk, Sweden.

Fax: +46 971 12057;


www.taigarescue.org

TRADE

ASEAN committed to controlling wildlife tradeThe ten members of the Association ofSoutheast Asian Nations (ASEAN)[meeting in Bangkok, Thailand] todayannounced a bold initiative to work togetherto address the region’s wildlife trade crisis.

WWF and TRAFFIC called upon theglobal CITES community to support actionin Southeast Asia, a region which has longplayed a role as supplier and tradeentrepôt for a significant portion of theglobal trade in wildlife. The region’s ownrich biodiversity makes it a target fortraders interested in a variety of animalsand plants ranging from tigers andelephants to rare orchids.

The ASEAN Statement on CITESfocuses on six key areas of cooperation.These include the need for increased lawenforcement cooperation, comprehensivelegal frameworks and more scientificinformation to be made available to guidewildlife trade management by CITESauthorities. Beyond the ASEAN Statementitself, the ten countries have agreed todevelop an Action Plan for 2005–2010.

As economic growth has increased,demand has risen in Southeast Asia forproducts such as birds and reptiles for thepet trade, luxury items made from ivory andhawksbill turtle shell products, and high-value traditional medicines such as muskand ginseng. (Source: WWF-TRAFFICPress Release, 11 October 2004.)

BiotradeEnvironmentally sustainable ‘‘biotrade’’ isgaining ground among the longstanding


31


commercial products that the Andeanregion puts on the international market.

The extraordinary biological wealth ofSouth America’s Andean countries isbeginning to pay off for those who takeadvantage of it. Despite the ecological andeconomic importance of preservingbiodiversity, the notion of leaving natureuntouched is falling by the wayside.

Colombia, Ecuador, Peru andVenezuela are four of the 12 countries inthe world with the greatest biodiversity.They are Andean countries, but they alsohold portions of the vast Amazon Basin.According to the development agency ofthe Andean Community of Nations (CAF),‘‘We are facing a new wave, marked bythe possibility of a boom in the intelligentuse of biodiversity, taking advantage of itin a sustainable way.”

Taking advantage of autochthonousresources for biotrade entails identifyingniche markets and even developing newforms of organization. A success story isBambú de Colombia, in business for morethan 30 years, and employing hundreds offamilies in planting and prevention ofdeforestation.

The Andean countries are trying topromote production for biotrade, ‘‘and ineach one we face difficulties in obtainingfinancing, the lack of research, the lack ofdevelopment of new products and afailure to consolidate what we have tooffer,’’ said a consultant to the ‘‘greenmarkets’’ group in the ColombianEnvironment Ministry.

CAF has already earmarkedUS$900 000 for programmes to fortifyinstitutional, business and communitydevelopment geared towards biotrade.

Trade and organizing rural andindigenous communities to make the mostof their natural resources are part of thefirst phase in the ‘‘new wave’’, before fullsustainable exploitation of biodiversity,which requires financing and research,and the region is far from obtaining those,said CAF.

Biotrade could be a boon to the Andeancountries, which also hold part of theAmazon, as a platform to pursuedevelopment in biodiversity and gainaccess to hungry markets, according to

studies that CAF entrusted to UnitedStates technology research centres.

As for the field of applied sciences inhealth and industry, in 2003 there were370 biotechnology pharmaceuticals indevelopment to treat more than 200diseases.

The Andean countries should step upvalue-added activities by taking advantageof their biodiversity, and intensify efforts toregulate and jointly negotiate theirpotential in integration and free tradeagreements that are under way.

One of the key aspects of the free tradeagreement that the United States isnegotiating with Colombia, Ecuador andPeru refers to access to the biologicalwealth of the three South Americancountries. (Source: [BIO-IPR] Resourcepointer, 16 August 2004, [email protected] Tierramérica.)

Trade controls on hoodia and Asian yew treesA United Nations conference approvedon Friday a proposal by African countriesto control trade in a rare plant sought bydrug companies for its appetite-suppressing properties. The hoodiacactus in question has been used forthousands of years by southern Africa’sSan Bushmen to dampen their appetitesduring long treks through the harshKalahari desert and holds the key topotentially lucrative anti-obesity drugs.

The Convention on International Tradein Endangered Species (CITES) listedthe hoodia plant in its Appendix II – whichwill regulate global trade in the species –at the behest of South Africa, Namibiaand Botswana.

It also adopted a Chinese and UnitedStates proposal to put Asian yew trees,

which provide the compound for one ofthe world’s top-selling chemotherapydrugs, in the same appendix.

That will give added protection toplants which could save untold humanlives while earning billions of dollars forbig drug companies.

Hoodia. South Africa’s Council forScientific and Industrial Research (CSIR)has patented the chemical entityextracted from hoodia and licensedBritish drugs-from-plants firmPhytopharm Plc to develop the plant’scommercial potential. Phytopharm said inJuly it welcomed moves to protect hoodiafrom illegal cultivation. “We would likepharmaceutical companies to producefinished products in the three countries,”said the South African delegate, addingthat there were structures in place toensure that the San Bushmen derivedbenefits from the product.

Valuable but fragile yew. For yearsChinese herbalists have used trees ofTaxus species, also known as yew trees,to treat common ailments. In the late1960s, scientists in North Carolina foundthat the extract of yew bark foughttumours. In the early 1990s, the UnitedStates Government approved the use ofpaclitaxel, also known as taxol, by drugcompany Bristol-Myers Squibb forchemotherapy. Taxol, whose patentexpired in the United States in 2001, isone of the best-selling drugs for treating avariety of cancers. In 2003, drug firmssold more than US$4 billion worth ofproducts with taxol and other drugsderived from yew trees known astaxanes. But conservationists say thevarious Taxus species are under threatfrom illegal harvesting and habitatdestruction in China. “This is a win forconservation as well as for trade,” saidthe head of the United States delegation.“It ensures the products come from legaland sustainable resources. And it’simportant to preserve the speciesbecause it has a great impact on the livesof many people.” (Source: Reuters, citedin Sustainable Africa Newsletter, 9October 2004.)


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Global trade in agarwoodGovernments today voted by anoverwhelming majority to regulate theglobal trade in agarwood, a little known buthigh-demand product that is possibly themost valuable non-timber forest productworldwide. The efforts of Indonesia andother range states in Asia to requestadditional management controls underCITES should help ensure that thecenturies-old trade continues at moresustainable levels, says TRAFFIC, thewildlife trade monitoring network.

“After more than a decade highlightingthe dangerous trends of overharvesting tosupply this trade, TRAFFIC is verypleased to see some collective action onthis issue,” said James Compton, Directorof TRAFFIC Southeast Asia. “TRAFFIC’swork with range states from Indiaeastwards to Papua New Guinea hasshown that this unique group of agarwood-producing tree species is clearlythreatened by trade and that, unless this isbetter regulated, long-term suppliesremain in jeopardy.”

The trade in agarwood, resinousdeposits of which are found in tree speciesof the genera Aquilaria and Gyrinops,dates back two thousand years and meetsthe cultural, medicinal and religious needsof societies from the Near East rightacross Asia to China (including Hong KongSpecial Administrative Region and TaiwanProvince) and Japan. It is also used in theproduction of high-grade incense andperfumes. In addition to the Appendix IIlisting endorsed today, CITES Partieshave called for an important dialoguebetween producers and consumers to beheld prior to the next meeting of theConference of the Parties to CITES.

“It is important to remember that CITESAppendix II is not a trade ban, but amanagement intervention that will helpensure legality, promote sustainability andenable more accurate monitoring of theagarwood trade,” Compton continued.

Increasing scarcity of supply has drivenagarwood prices progressively higher, tothe extent that mid-level grades are soldfor US$1 000 per kilogram in markets suchas Bangkok and Singapore, and can fetchmore than US$10 000 per kilogram in the

end-consumer markets of the Near Eastand East Asia. Although harvest and tradeis controlled by permit systems in majorexporters such as Indonesia andMalaysia, the monetary incentives toextract agarwood illegally from the lowlandforests of Asia far outweigh compliancewith the law. Organized groups of illegalharvesters have been documentedencroaching national parks in countriesincluding Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysiaand Thailand.

A single agarwood-producing species,Aquilaria malaccensis, has been listed onCITES Appendix II since 1995. But havingonly one species out of more than 20 listedon CITES has caused implementation andlaw enforcement difficulties, particularly asagarwood is traded in the form of wood,wood chips and oil, which makes it almostimpossible to distinguish between species.The harmonizing of trade controls for allAquilaria and Gyrinops species underCITES, therefore, should streamlinemanagement of the trade. (Source:TRAFFIC Press Release, 13 October2004.)

TREE AID

Tree Aid works in Africa’s drylands toreverse poverty and environmentaldegradation through skills transfer andcommunity forestry projects that includeincome generation. Income from non-wood forest products is a focus of theirnew “Community Forestry and

Sustainable Livelihoods” Programme inWest Africa.

For further information, please contact:

Yacouba Ouedraogo, West Africa

Programme Coordinator,

Tree Aid West Africa,

BP 9321, Ouagadougou 06,

Burkina Faso.

Fax: +226 36 02 54;


www.treeaid.org.uk

WHO CONSERVES THEWORLD’S FORESTS?

Indigenous people and othercommunities who live in and around theworld’s tropical forests are often aseffective as their national governments atconserving forests, and are outspendingforeign donors by as much as two to one,according to a new study by ForestTrends, an IUCN member organizationbased in Washington, DC.

Some 240 million indigenous and localcommunity people own and manage aboutone fifth of the world’s tropical forests, andinvest US$1.2 billion to $2.6 billion a yearin forest management and conservation,according to the study Who conserves theworld’s forests? Community-drivenstrategies to protect forests and respectrights, by Augusta Molnar, Sara J. Scherrand Arvind Khare (online at: www.forest-trends.org/resources/pdf/Who%20Conserves%2007-23.pdf). (Source: IUCN, 26July 2004 [in CENN, Daily Digest, 27 July2004].)


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