MOTION FOR A RESOLUTION

20.10.2005

to wind up the debate on the statement by the Commission
pursuant to Rule 103(2) of the Rules of Procedure
by Umberto Guidoni, Marco Rizzo, Ilda Figueiredo, Pedro Guerreiro and Sylvia-Yvonne Kaufmann
on behalf of the GUE/NGL Group
on legal protection of biotechnological inventions

B6‑0556/2005

European Parliament resolution on legal protection of biotechnological inventions

The European Parliament,

–  having regard to the Convention on the Grant of European patents (European Patent Convention) of 5 October 1973,

–  having regard to Directive 98/44/EC on the legal protection of biotechnological inventions,

–  having regard to Rule 103(2) of its Rules of Procedure,

A.  whereas the EU Member States have different approaches towards the implementation and interpretation of Directive 98/44/EC on the legal protection of biotechnological inventions,

B.  whereas biotechnology companies and researchers are claiming the effective right to manipulate the genetic composition of life forms, including not only micro-organisms but human beings, animals and plants, on a large scale,

C.  whereas the availability of what would effectively be patents on life forms would open the doors to biopiracy and threaten access to traditional knowledge for communities around the world, as well as depriving them of both the direct and the potential economic benefits which might be gained from a combination of such knowledge with modern scientific techniques,

D.  whereas patents on life forms are preventing farmers from carrying out their traditional practices of seed saving and seed exchange, leading to the disappearance of the world's seed diversity and increasing control over the world's food by a small number of corporations; whereas the biodiversity, seed diversity and traditional knowledge of developing countries in particular are therefore seriously threatened by the broadening of patent protection,

E.  having regard to the public hearing at the European Patent Office (EPO) before the Opposition Division concerning patent EP 0695351 with the title 'Isolation, selection and propagation of animal transgenic stem cells' (the so-called Edinburgh patent) and its conclusion that uses of human embryos for industrial and commercial purposes are excluded from patentability,

F.  whereas the existing, internationally recognised system of plant variety protection has been highly successful in encouraging research into plant development and whereas patent protection of seeds and plants has led to an undermining of the regulation of plant variety protection, which is also impeded by far-reaching and conflicting monopoly rights,

G.  whereas by acquiring the effective right to patent life forms the biotechnology industry would potentially gain control not only over its own genetically engineered organisms, but also over our food chain and ultimately over the planet's genetic heritage,

1.  Stresses that there should be no patents on any part of the body or genome of any living being, whether micro-organism, plant, animal or human;

2.  Opposes, therefore, the patenting of all forms of life and the release of genetically manipulated organisms into the wider environment;

3.  Calls for the review process of Directive 98/44/EC to clarify that human beings, animals and plants, including seeds, as well as micro-organisms and all other living organisms and their parts cannot be patented, and that natural processes that produce plants, animals and other living organisms should also not be patentable;

4.   Opposes any use of the patent system which would effectively encourage biopiracy or in any way deny communities access to their own traditional knowledge;

5.   Calls on the Commission and the governments of the Member States to encourage research and development programmes which enable such traditional knowledge to be combined with modern scientific methods to the benefit of all humanity, for instance in the development of new medicines, foodstuffs and other useful materials;

6.   Opposes any use of the patent system which might serve to prevent farmers from carrying out their traditional practices of seed saving and seed exchange, or in any other way damage either the livelihoods of farmers, the interests of consumers or the world's seed diversity, or increase control of the world's food supply by a small number of corporations;

7.  Instructs its President to forward this resolution to the Council, the Commission, the Member States and the European Patent Office.