Why in the News?
The National Biodiversity Authority (NBA) has released new rules to regulate access to biological resources and ensure fair and equitable benefit sharing, as approved by the Central Government.
About New Biodiversity Regulation, 2025:
- It governs how benefits from the use of biological resources and associated traditional knowledge or digital sequence information (DSI) are to be shared.
- It introduces a tiered benefit-sharing structure based on annual turnover of the user:
- No sharing for turnover up to ₹5 crore.
- 0.2% for turnover between ₹5–50 crore.
- 0.4% for ₹50–250 crore, and 0.6% above ₹250 crore.
- Users must submit resource usage statements annually if turnover exceeds ₹1 crore.
- Cultivated medicinal plants are exempt, aligning with the Biodiversity (Amendment) Act, 2023.
- For high-value or threatened species like red sanders, agarwood, and sandalwood, sharing must be at least 5%, rising to 20% or more for commercial use.
- The Regulation covers researchers, IP right seekers, and includes digital data as part of benefit sharing for the first time.
Back2Basics: Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD):
Nagoya Protocol on ABS:
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| [UPSC 2023] Consider the following statements:
1. In India, the Biodiversity Management Committees are key to the realization of the objectives of the Nagoya Protocol. 2. The Biodiversity Management Committees have important functions in determining acces and benefit sharing, including the power to levy collection fees on the access of biological resources within its jurisdiction. Which of the statements given above is/are correct? Options: (a) 1 only (b) 2 only (c) Both 1 and 2* (d) Neither 1 nor 2 |
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