Recently, some U.S. corporations and universities claimed to  have "discovered" a miracle corn here in the mountains of Oaxaca that did what corn is not supposed to be able to do: fix nitrogen from the air to fertilize itself without the need of chemical fertilizers. Of course the indigenous communities here have used this corn for centuries. It is the product of thousands of years of communal biogenetic work and it is rightly considered communal property. Nevertheless the group of corporations and universities involved attempted to patent this corn or some genetic element from it in the United States. Fortunately, their patent application was denied, but in response, the "Espacio" for the Defense of the Native Corn Varieties of Oaxaca, developed the following notice to universities and corporate centers of investigation.

NOTICE TO UNIVERSITIES, CENTERS OF INVESTIGATION AND CORPORATIONS ON WORKING IN INDIGENOUS PUEBLOS AND COMMUNITIES WITH THEIR BIODIVERSITY.

 

The regions of the planet that are richest in biodiversity are principally in indigenous territories. These territories are found in 87 countries and make up a fourth of the earth’s land mass. In our times this rich biodiversity is a principle focus of scientific and academic investigation in universities, centers of investigation, and international corporations around the world principally for its possible commercial value. For this reason, we, the indigenous pueblos of the state of Oaxaca, Mexico are obliged to give notice: it is not an accident that the greater part of this remaining part of the earth’s biodiversity is found in indigenous territories for three reasons.

1.       Much of the biodiversity that is found in these indigenous territories is not merely the result of natural biological evolution but rather is the product of and the accomplishment of thousands of years of scientific and communal investigation. Corn itself and many of the varieties of corn so coveted y Northern corporations, for example, are creations of this communal science which has been practiced for almost 10 thousand years in Mesoamerica. When Western investigators and academics come across this kind of biodiversity they are not “discovering” anything “new” but rather the inventions, accomplishments and communal “property” of ancestral pueblos.

2.        The reasons why this biodiversity still exists in these territories is important. It has been preserved by a civilization that does not value individualism, nor individual accumulation and privatization of property. When you enter into these indigenous territories you are entering into another civilization…and into a different economic system where your intellectual property interests, interests in privatization and rights of obtention don’t apply. YOU CAN NOT PATENT COMMUNAL PROPERTY!!

3.       The third reason is obvious to us, the indigenous peoples, but might pass unnoticed to you. Your western civilization is in the process of reducing all of reality to its commercial value and placing a price on it. This concept is putting at risk your own civilization, economically, ecologically and socially. For us, on the other hand, all beings, all things, and territories of this creation are sacred and deserve respect. This respect is the another reason why so much biodiversity still exists on our lands. The lack of respect for the sacredness of the planet is what is carrying our western civilization to self-destruction.