Equitable and Sustainable Use of Genetic Resources

Dear Colleagues,

Genetic resources enhance the potentials of medical science and agricultural biotechnology, encompassing the invention of new medicine for incurable diseases such as cancer and HIV, and the development of transgenic crops. Thus the prospecting for genetic resources, which are essential for the development of new medicine and commercial crops, has gained more interest from the biotechnology-related business circle. Furthermore, it is noteworthy that a man-made gene and its derived compounds are alleged to be patentable because they do not originally derive from nature. In this sense, prospecting for genetic resources provides a good source of wealth to inventors and developers of new products deriving from genetic engineering.
In the meanwhile, increasing attractiveness of genetic engineering triggers the following problems:
・loss of biodiversity as the result of commercialization of genetic resources;
・biosafety at stake especially attributed to the spread of transgenic crops;
・conflict of interests between prospectors and custodians of genetic resources;
・piracy of traditional knowledge collectively owned by indigenous community.
With this background, more researches are presently needed to address the argument on the equitable and sustainable use of genetic resources among all the stakeholders. Therefore, we would like to call for papers to disseminate and share thoughts or findings on the above-stated topic. Papers are selected by a rigorous peer review procedure with the aim of rapid and wide dissemination of research results in this area. Original research paper or critical reviews are invited.

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