Biopiracy of natural products and good bioprospecting practice
Abstract
Biopiracy mainly focuses on the use of biological resources and/or knowledge of indigenoustribes or communities without allowing them to share the revenues generated out of economic exploita-tion or other non-monetary incentives associated with the resource/knowledge.Methods:Based on collaborations of scientists from five continents, we have created a communicationplatform to discuss not only scientific topics, but also more general issues with social relevance. Thisplatform was termed ‘PhytCancer-Phytotherapy to Fight Cancer’ (www.phyt-cancer.uni-mainz.de). As astarting point, we have chosen the topic “biopiracy”, since we feel this is of pragmatic significance forscientists working with medicinal plants.