Traditional Knowledge, medicinal plants and intellectual property: biopiracy or bioprospection?

Abstract

The main objective of this work is to reveal the awareness status of the biopiracy/bioprospection theme among selected actors of the Filière of Medicinal Plants in Brazil. It was achieved according to the qualitative research approach and the Filière's systemic vision. The techniques employed in the data collection were the interview and the non-participant observation. It's concluded that the theme's perception is superficial and embryonic, and due to the data's individualist character present in the most of the actors speech, the market logic is prevalent, thus to convert the illegitimate and injuring use and appropriation of the traditional knowledge associated with the medicinal plants into equitable and sustainable forms of development, it's necessary a greater involvement of the filières actors as a whole to foment the recover of the State's attributions of coordination, monitoring and inducement.