“INTERNATIONAL Piracy Rights” is how environmental activist Vandana Shiva
describes the global legislation governing patents in Protect or Plunder?
Understanding Intellectual Property Rights (Zed, £9.99). Reading this
passionately argued book, you’d be hard put not to agree with her.
Shiva lays out the sorry tale of how the rich countries get richer at the
expense of poorer countries by hijacking not only the rights to profit from
indigenous species, but also local knowledge of how to use those species. She
quotes the attempt to patent India’s neem tree as a pesticide, even
though people have been using it in…
