VIVAnews - Thirty-three developing countries from Africa, Latin America and Asia, including Indonesia, will hold discussion on protection over cultural heritages on November 23-27 in Bali.
Foreign Affairs Department Director of Economic and Social & Cultural Agreements Damos Dumoli Agusman said the forum will aim at preparing a draft on international legal instruments related to genetic resources, traditional knowledge and folklore.
The draft, Agusman said, would be presented before the 15th Intergovernmental Committee-World Intellectual Property Organization (IGC-WIPO) in December in Geneva, Switzerland and is expected to be followed up into an agreement or a convention, not merely a resolution.
Agusman also said the draft would be based on academic analysis because experts from the FAO, WIPO and CBD (Convention on Biological Diversity) will be also attending the meeting to share their knowledge.
“Indonesia’s interest in fighting for the existence of legal instruments for cultural heritages is really high. Despite UNESCO’s recognition on Batik as our heritage, we still have concerns,” he said in Jakarta on Wednesday, November 18.
“This is our struggle for cultural heritages on international level in order to overcome cultural claims and urge the completion of the law on knowledge and traditional cultural expression protection which is currently being designed by us,” Agusman said.
In the upcoming forum, there will be identification and introduction of each country’s cultural items. “The cultural works of each country will be identified in the forum. For example, Batik and Pendet Dance will be identified as Indonesia’s belongings”, he said. However, the bilateral issue of Pendet Dance’s claim by Malaysia will not be discussed. “It’s not a bilateral forum, “Agusman said.
The identification initiative would be the first step. Later, the countries will be dealing with defensive protection method that is considered being able to give effective protection while other forms of protections like national legislation has not been enforced. The method will be governed by WIPO, including imposing sanctions if there is any country’s cultural form, like traditional dances, is performed by other countries.
The third step would be benefit sharing. Because it is the communal-based culture that will be the topic of discussion, the sharing will be overseen by the countries.
Agusman assured this type of benefit sharing is different than the distribution of royalty in proprietary.”Proprietary is about names and ownerships while cultural heritages belong to communities,” he said.
Earlier, Agusman explained that the background of the forum establishment is the polarization in the WIPO in which developed countries oppose the creation of legal instruments for traditional genetic knowledge and folklore.
“Because the instruments would diminish or at least restricting what they called innovation, creativity and others,” he said.
“Imagine if they have to seek permission from Indonesia to conduct a research or making industrial products and having to identify traditional elements they’re using, like ginger for example. It will be difficult for them,” Agusman said. “As for African countries, many of their resources are exploited by industrial developed countries while their countries remain poor”.
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Translated by: Nataya Ermanti
