Cattle Biopiracy

The Roslin Institute Patent Applications on Genes from Bos indicus (Indian Cattle Breed)

India is the most significant source of the cattle diversity in the world and India's cattle breeds are being used in Australia, South Africa, Latin America and USA for developing major livestock economies. While India's gift of its animal wealth to the world's economy has not undermined our own sovereignty to his wealth, the emergence of the animal patenting and cattle biopiracy creates a major threat to the sovereignty of animal biodiversity.

Among our most famous breeds are "Ongole, Gir, Hallikar, Tharparkar, Sindhi, Vechur, Khillari, Nimari, Kangayam, Hariana, Krishna Valley, Sahiwal, Kankrej, Amritmahal, Bachaur, Bhagnari, Dajjal, Gaolao, Mewati, Nagori, Rath, Hissar or Hansi, Sanchori, Kenkatha, Kherigarh, Malvi, Ponwar, Tarai, Dangi, Deoni, Dhanni, Barrgur. These diverse and rich breeds are being used world wide to enhance the genetic wealth of cattle. However in India our cattle biodiversity is under severe threats through cross breeding programme which are replacing our unique breeds with crossbred Jersey and Holstein cows. On the one hand this is displacing our indigenous diversity, on the other hand it is leading to the severe erosion of draught cattle and the replacement of renewable animal energy with imported fossil fuel.

A recent controversy has erupted in Kerala over the extinction and piracy of the unique Indian breed called "Vechur" or "Vechoor". The Vechur is a short draught cattle, the smallest cattle variety in the world. The average height of an adult Vechur cow is only 87 cms, length 124 cms and weight 125 kg. This rare breed is being conserved by the Kerala Agriculture University (KAU) livestock farm at Mannuthy in an Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) founded ex-situ conservation programme.

The most important genetic quality of the Vechur breed is the high fat content in milk - from 6.02 per cent to 7.86 percent. The fat percentage of Europe's high yielding varieties ranges between 3.5 and 4.5 per cent. The butter production capacity of milk is highly dependent on the fat content. An institution in a developed country can earn billions of dollars per year if they develop a new breed through transferring Vechur genes if we fail to assert and claim the Vechur as part of the sovereign national heritage through our National Biodiversity Laws.

The name Vechur has been repeatedly coming up in the context of research and patent application by the Roslin Institute which is a leading institute in animal genetic engineering and became famous through the cloning of Dolly. Roslin Institute has commercial links with the PPL Therapeutics Ltd. and they jointly held the patent on Dolly.

The Roslin Institute has been denying the use of genetic material from Indian cattle and it has also denied having any patent application based on such research.

A patent search by Research Foundation for Science, Technology and Ecology in collaboration with Public Interest groups in Europe has confirmed that the Roslin Institute and the PPL Therapeutics (Scotland) Ltd. has 14 patent applications with the European Patent Office (EPO) and one of these clearly refers to an Indian Cattle Breed.

This patent no. EP 0765390 on the Alpha - Lactalbumin Gene Constructs, states: "The present invention provides recombinant gene constructs for expressing protein a-lactalbumin, especially human a-lactalbumin, in bovine cells." Further on in the text (which is 80 pages long!), there is a paragraph discussing the biology of bovine a-lactalbumin. It states (p.17): "There are three known variants of bovine a-lactalbumin, of which the B form is the most common. The A variant from BOS NOMADICUS F.D. INDICUS differs from the B variant at residue 10: GLU in A is substituted for ARG in B."

The Roslin patent for the Gene Construct of Bovine Alpha - Lactalbumin has no scientific reference cited for the claim. Since this is based on an Indian breed there is every possibility that the basic research was done in India and 'pirated by the Roslin Institute'. Since all Indian cattle breeds in spite of their diversity are called Bos indicus, the patent claim itself confirms that an Indian breed was used. Which of the many Indian cattle breed has been used by the Roslin Institute for its patent application no. EP 0765390 needs to be investigated by the Government of India or whether this was the Vechur? Whether the breed was the famous and nearly extinct the "Vechur" breed of Kerala can only be confirmed by investigating the research of the Kerala Agriculture University? Was the research on the A-varient lactalbumin done by the scientist at KAU? If not, who did it? How does Roslin know about it? Did Kerala Agricultural University scientists worked with the Roslin researchers or Roslin doing the research in Scotland? In which case how did they get the material? Since India is on the process of drafting its biodiversity law which will regulate and govern access to our biodiversity, the case of the Roslin patents and the status of the Vechur are important examples of the piracy that needs to be prevented through the Indian Biodiversity Act. The status of India's animal biodiversity wealth and the biopiracy of the wealth is too important to the survival of the Indian agriculture and the small and marginal farmers to be left unattended. The Government of India should immediately investigate the full scope of cattle biopiracy for India.