Legal rights soon to forest dwellers over biological resources

In what is sure to give a much-needed boost to biological conservation in Uttarakhand, a move is underway to grant legal rights to forest dependent communities over all biological resources, according to officials.

The ownership rights over biological resources would be vested with communities in compliance with the Biological Diversity Act.

Enacted in 2002, the Central law was brought in to implement the three-point preamble of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). It was signed by 194 countries at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development held at Rio de Janeiro way back in June 1992.

The Convention makes it mandatory for the signatory countries to implement its threepoint preamble. It includes conservation of biodiversity, sustainable use of biodiversity and fair and equitable share of the benefits arising out of the use of biological resources.

The Biological Diversity Act is being implemented in the country by the Uttarakhand Biodiversity Board. “India is probably the first country in the world that enacted the law in question to implement the three-point preamble of the Convention on Biological Diversity,” said Rakesh Shah, chairman of the Uttarakhand Biodiversity Board (UBB). “The implementation of the central law in the mountain state began in 2011.”

“A Biodiversity Management Committee (BMC) each is being constituted in all the (8,000) village panchayats,” Shah said adding that the BMCs would have complete legal control over all biological resources under the jurisdiction of panchayats.

“760 BMCs have been constituted in the state,” said Dhananjay Prasad, deputy director of Uttarakhand Biodiversity Board.

He said each BMC would have an inventory of all biological resources available in a panchayat area. “These inventories will be known as People Biodiversity Registers (PBRs)…And as per the law, it would be mandatory for the BMCs to prepare PBRs having details of all biological resources,” Shah told HT.

“No agency or individual can touch these biological resources without prior permission from the BMCs,” Shah said. “For instance, the BMC can refuse any agency the permission to set up a hydropower project on a river falling under the jurisdiction of a panchayat if it thinks such a unit would cause ecological damage.”

“Under the Central law, no pharmaceutical company can extract medicinal plants or herbs from a panchayat area without the BMCs permission,” Prasad said. If the permission is granted, it would be mandatory for pharmaceutical companies to pay collection fee to the BMCs.

Whatever income the panchayats get, they will have to spend that amount on conservation of biological diversity in their area. “The entire process would help bring about an ecological turnaround in the hill state where natural resources are depleting fast,” Prasad told HT.