and

The aim of this paper is to discuss the various ways in which traditional knowledge can be adequately protected. Part I of the paper examines the means of protection that exist in the current legal system, and discusses whether these modes of protection are adequate given the characteristics of traditional knowledge. Part II discusses how the International Cooperative Biodiversity Group (ICBG) at Washington University in St. Louis used a combination of various methods of protection to effectively protect the traditional knowledge obtained during an ethnobotanical project in Peru. The paper concludes by discussing alternative modes of protection. What is traditional knowledge and why should it be protected? Anthropologist Johnson1 defines traditional knowledge as a body of knowledge built by a group of people living in close contact with nature. It includes a system of classification, a set of empirical observations about the local environment and a system of self-management that governs resource use. The characteristics of traditional knowledge include: • Creation over a long period of time in which it has been passed down from generation to generation; • Constant improvements as new knowledge is integrated to the existing; • Both creation and improvement of knowledge is a group effort. Yet the individual’s role can not be underestimated in this group effort. For instance, an Achuar (Jivaro) man bitten by a snake in an isolated area of the Peruvian rain forest was provided a snakebite remedy by a bicultural Candoshi-Achuar man who knew of this remedy from his mother’s tribe, but one unknown to the Achuar. On drinking the preparation the man felt relief from pain around the puncture site, perhaps due to reduced inflammation. On return to his community he expounded the virtues of this “new” antivenomous plant, and on a return visit in six months we discovered that this treatment had become generally adopted as part of the Achuar traditional pharmacopeia, all as a consequence of one man’s experience.