RECOMMENDATIONS
OF THE INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON MEDICINAL PLANTS,TRADITIONAL MEDICINE
& LOCAL COMMUNITIES IN AFRICA:CHALLENGES & OPPORTUNITIES OF THE NEW
MILLENNIUM
A Parallel Session to the Conference of Parties (COP-5) to the
Convention on Biodiversity (CBD), Nairobi, Kenya, 15-26 May 2000.
The International Conference on Medicinal Plants, Traditional Medicine
and Local Communities in Africa: Challenges and Opportunities of the new
Millennium was hosted by the Environment Liaison Centre International ,
Nairobi, Kenya.
It was convened by ELCI and the Global Initiative for Traditional
Systems( GIFTS) of Health of the University of Oxford, UK and the
Commonwealth Working Group on Traditional & Complementary Health
Systems. It attracted more than 200 international delegates representing
major key stakeholders from 50 countries from all over the world. The
Conference was held in Nairobi, Kenya, at the International Centre for
Research in Agroforestry (ICRAF) from 16th to 19th May 2000.
It is our pleasure to release the following conference recommendations.
CONFERENCE RECOMMENDATIONS:
I. Recommendations to the 5th Meeting of the Conference of the Parties
(COP) to the Convention on Biological Diversity and to the COP/CBD
Process
I.1.Establish an International Working Group for promoting, monitoring
and assessing the conservation, management and sustainable use of
medicinal plants and traditional medicines used for human and
livestock health care by providing appropriate financial mechanisms to
support:
· An African inventory and genetic assessment of medicinal
plants;
· Community-based in-situ conservation and management of
ecosystems with high medicinal plant species diversity;
· Development of sustainable harvesting guidelines of wild medicinal
resources;
· Identification and development of cultivation/propagation practices;
· Information dissemination, networking, education and awareness
raising programs;
· Interdisciplinary research into the efficacy, safety cultural
importance and use of traditional medicine and adding value to the
medicinal plants and phytomedicines; and
· Co-ordinating and catalyzing the existing activities relating to
medicinal plants and traditional health systems at international level.
I.2. To establish an appropriate mechanism for the effective
involvement of indigenous and local communities in redefining and
monitoring intellectual property rights
in the context of traditional medicine.
I.3. To establish a mechanism to formalise, monitor and regulate the
trade in medicinal plants and herbal products, in order to guarantee
local communities fair
and equitable access to benefits flowing from the trade; and to ensure
that, the trade is transparent and sustainable.
II. FOLLOW-UP ACTION
II.1.African governments and the Organisation of Africa Unity (OAU)
should adopt as soon as possible a Decade devoted to the promotion and
development of medicinal
plants, traditional medicines and pharmacopoeia in Africa.
II.2. The Conference recommends to the Government of the Republic of
Togo and His Excellency GNASSINGBE EYADEMA, President of the Republic
and Head Of State to kindly submit the Conference Declaration on the
Decade on Medicinal Plants and Traditional
Medicines in Africa to the attention of the forthcoming OAU Summit.
II.3. Governments, NGOs and International Agencies should take urgent
steps to support activities and strategies for Research and
Development on Medicinal Plants and
Traditional Medicine relating to addressing priority diseases in Africa
such as HIV/AIDS and Malaria.
II.4. To use existing electronic networking opportunities (e.g."
Phytomedica " worldwide emailing list) in order to promote
constructive relationships and collaboration between diverse
stakeholders and interested parties active in the field of medicinal
plants, traditional medicine and pharmacopoeia.
II.5 . African Governments in partnership with NGOs and International
Agencies should find urgent ways to support the implementation of the
recommendations and the comprehensive Regional Action Plan outlined
by the Regional Workshops on Medicinal
Plants and Traditional Medicine in Africa jointly organised by the
Environment Liaison Centre International (ELCI) and the International
Development Research Centre (IDRC) held successively on 17-21
November 1997 in Conakry, Republic of Guinea for African French
speaking countries and on 14-18 April 1998 in Cape Town, South Africa
for African English speaking countries.
II.6. To establish and convene a two year regular conference to review
progress in implementing the Programme of the Decade and to plan for
future action, focusing on
priority and specific issues and objectives.
The Nairobi Declaration:
FORMALLY RECOGNISE TRADITIONAL MEDICINE
We, the participants of the Nairobi Conference on Medicinal Plants,
Traditional Medicines and Local Communities in Africa: Challenges and
Opportunities of the New Millennium do hereby confirm our commitment to
the collective goal of Health for All through the primary health care
approach and the principles of conservation and sustainable development
outlined in the Convention of Biological Diversity.
Whereas:
· in sub-Saharan Africa in 1999, there were 6,027 deaths a day due to
the HIV/AIDS epidemic, 2,345 deaths a day due to malaria, and 8,181
deaths a day due to diarrhoea; and
· traditional medicines are often the only affordable and accessible
forms of healthcare for the majority of the African rural population;
and
· local health traditions - many of which are oral in nature and
therefore largely undocumented - are being lost; and
· traditional health systems have not been replaced by the "Western"
system because traditional healing is deeply embedded in wider belief
systems and remains an integral part of the lives of most African
people;
We, draw attention to the fact that:
· African governments have not acknowledged or built upon this
traditional knowledge resource-base, thereby making the goal of Health
for All more difficult to achieve unless these resources are mobilized
and used more effectively;
· the unsustainable, unregulated and indiscriminant harvesting of
medicinal plant species is being compounded by the very low level of
understanding of the biology and ecology of the species concerned;
· it is unlikely that social, technical or economic changes in
developing countries over the next decade will reduce significantly
the dependency of rural peoples on medicinal plants species resources;
· though there are few reliable data on global trade of medicinal plants
the loss of species would be a catastrophic blow to productivity,
balance of payments, national debt, and GDP.
We, call on the Presidents of all African countries to declare the
period 2000 - 2010 the Decade of African Traditional Medicine and commit
their governments through the appropriate ministries to:
· formally recognize the value of Traditional Health Systems alongside
modern health systems in national primary healthcare as an available
intervention option in the fight against HIV/AIDS and other
communicable diseases;
· identify compelling scientific methods to evaluate and standardize
traditional herbal remedies in order to promote their safe, effective
and affordable use;
· develop comprehensive strategies/policies for the conservation,
management and sustainability of supply of medicinal plant species;
· identify legal strategies that protect the Intellectual Property
Rights (IPR) of knowledge holders;
· formally recognize the value and contribution of ethno-veterinary
knowledge in livestock healthcare;
· establish an annual recognition week that acknowledges the important
role that women play in home healthcare through their knowledge and
use of medicinal plant species.
· work with the World Trade Organization (WTO) to identify a process
that effectively regulates the international trade of African
medicinal plant species and protects individual country's resources
and rights;
· establish a partnership of countries to protect and enhance this
aspect of African cultural heritage.
Conference Participants
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
SPEECH OF THE ENVIRONMENT AND NATURAL RESOURCES MINISTER ,HONORABLE
FRANCIS NYENZE READ BY HIMSELF FOR THE OPENING THE CONFERENCE ON 16 MAY
2000
Distinguished Participants, Ladies and Gentlemen.
I am happy to be here today to open this important conference on
Medicinal Plants, Traditional Medicines and Local Communities in
Africa: Challenges and Opportunities for the new Millennium. I take this
opportunity to welcome you all to Kenya on behalf of the Government of
Kenya.
This Conference is a parallel session to the Conference of Parties
(COP-5) to the Convention on Biodiversity (CBD) which began on Monday.
I note that the conference is being supported by various international
organizations and Donors which include the Canadian International
Development Research Centre ( IDRC), UNAIDS, Commonwealth, European
Union , United Nations Development Programme ( UNDP), and other
Agencies. On behalf of the Government of Kenya, I thank all these
agencies for their financial support of the conference.
I understand that the conference will address issues pertaining to the
Sustainable use of medicinal plants and the conservation of these
plants. This is an issue of great importance not only to Kenya but to
all nations around the world. Every year all sectors of the Kenyan
Nation participate in tree planting exercises and these events are led
by His Excellency the President of Kenya himself. I hope that your
deliberations will tackle matters concerning the rapid depletion of
flora and fauna in many parts of the developing world due to practices
that are detrimental to the continued survival of our forests. The
international trade in some of the plants such as Prunus africana and
the aloes, and in animals such as the horns of the rhino and elephant
tasks, must be viewed seriously.
I have observed that this conference will also discuss the role of
traditional medicine in our health care systems. As you will all agree,
a very significant proportion of the people in the world today has
turned to the use of traditional remedies prepared from plant or animal
materials.
Another issue which I have noted that you will be discussing is the
protection of the intellectual property rights of traditional healers
and others who have mastered the art of applying our traditional
sciences to provide alternative healing services where the modern
conventional remedies have failed. The excessive exploitation of the
indigenous knowledge of our peoples must be carefully protected.
Over the years, the importance of specific plant species for primary
health care has received some recognition from official authorities and
policy institutions. Medicinal plants deserve special attention because
they are of great value in averting or treating common illnesses.
Because of the high cost of imported drugs, many African health
ministries are now encouraging the use of local medicinal plants in
order to give underprivileged populations alternative to primary health
care, and have established departments of traditional pharmacopoeia to
implement this policy.
This acknowledgement has been extremely vital in efforts to conserve
medicinal bio-diversity. But the preservation of such plants has
depended mainly on how indigenous and local communities have treated
ecosystems in general. In fact, traditional healers have not only
directed much of their attention to plants of direct medicinal
relevance, but also to the conservation of adjoining areas where
non-medicinal species grow.
While international efforts have concentrated on issues of
bio-conservation in developing countries, no formula has been devised to
compensate local communities for the genetic resources which they helped
to conserve and which have had significant pharmaceutical spin-off for
industrialized countries.
In Africa, more than 80% of the continent's population relies on plant
and animal-based medicines to meet their health care requirements. As
Africa's population grows, demand for traditional medicines will
increase, and pressure on natural resources will become greater than
ever.
We expect that your deliberations will address the following priorities
pertaining to the issues highlighted above:
1. Strategies and mechanisms initiating and implementing an African
decade devoted to development and promotion of medicinal plants
,traditional medicine and pharmacopoeia;
2.Outline of an African wide agenda and process for development of the
sector;
3.The need for the Biodiversity Convention processes to reflect
specifically, medicinal plants and traditional medicine and protection
of customary Intellectual property rights;
4. Activities and strategies for Research and Development relating to
addressing priority diseases using medicinal plants and traditional
medicine.
Ladies and gentlemen, the current pandemics of HIV/AIDS and Malaria have
raised very important questions on the utilisation of our indigenous
remedies. As you all know, the Commonwealth Heads of State met in
Durban, South Africa in November 1999 to declare HIV/AIDS a national
disaster in Africa. Last month, the African heads of state also met in
Abuja Nigeria to deliberate on strategies for eliminating the scourge of
Malaria.
It has often been said that Nature has a unique way of providing the
solution for treatment near where disease conditions occur. If this
supposition is true, then indeed we must find the treatment for HIV/AIDS
and Malaria among our vast flora and fauna.
In conclusion, ladies and gentlemen, I believe that it is possible to
use modern science and technology to seek among our vast biodiversity
remedies for our current pandemics. In this effort, I exhort you to
leave no stone unturned, but rational and sustainable methods should be
applied.
Once again, I welcome you all, and I invite especially those of you
coming from outside Kenya to enjoy our hospitality. Take the
opportunity to visit the National Parks and enjoy the our wildlife and
biodiversity in general.
And, with great pleasure, I declare this Regional Conference on
Medicinal Plants, Traditional Medicines and Local Communities in
Africa,officially open.
OF THE INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON MEDICINAL PLANTS,TRADITIONAL MEDICINE
& LOCAL COMMUNITIES IN AFRICA:CHALLENGES & OPPORTUNITIES OF THE NEW
MILLENNIUM
A Parallel Session to the Conference of Parties (COP-5) to the
Convention on Biodiversity (CBD), Nairobi, Kenya, 15-26 May 2000.
The International Conference on Medicinal Plants, Traditional Medicine
and Local Communities in Africa: Challenges and Opportunities of the new
Millennium was hosted by the Environment Liaison Centre International ,
Nairobi, Kenya.
It was convened by ELCI and the Global Initiative for Traditional
Systems( GIFTS) of Health of the University of Oxford, UK and the
Commonwealth Working Group on Traditional & Complementary Health
Systems. It attracted more than 200 international delegates representing
major key stakeholders from 50 countries from all over the world. The
Conference was held in Nairobi, Kenya, at the International Centre for
Research in Agroforestry (ICRAF) from 16th to 19th May 2000.
It is our pleasure to release the following conference recommendations.
CONFERENCE RECOMMENDATIONS:
I. Recommendations to the 5th Meeting of the Conference of the Parties
(COP) to the Convention on Biological Diversity and to the COP/CBD
Process
I.1.Establish an International Working Group for promoting, monitoring
and assessing the conservation, management and sustainable use of
medicinal plants and traditional medicines used for human and
livestock health care by providing appropriate financial mechanisms to
support:
· An African inventory and genetic assessment of medicinal
plants;
· Community-based in-situ conservation and management of
ecosystems with high medicinal plant species diversity;
· Development of sustainable harvesting guidelines of wild medicinal
resources;
· Identification and development of cultivation/propagation practices;
· Information dissemination, networking, education and awareness
raising programs;
· Interdisciplinary research into the efficacy, safety cultural
importance and use of traditional medicine and adding value to the
medicinal plants and phytomedicines; and
· Co-ordinating and catalyzing the existing activities relating to
medicinal plants and traditional health systems at international level.
I.2. To establish an appropriate mechanism for the effective
involvement of indigenous and local communities in redefining and
monitoring intellectual property rights
in the context of traditional medicine.
I.3. To establish a mechanism to formalise, monitor and regulate the
trade in medicinal plants and herbal products, in order to guarantee
local communities fair
and equitable access to benefits flowing from the trade; and to ensure
that, the trade is transparent and sustainable.
II. FOLLOW-UP ACTION
II.1.African governments and the Organisation of Africa Unity (OAU)
should adopt as soon as possible a Decade devoted to the promotion and
development of medicinal
plants, traditional medicines and pharmacopoeia in Africa.
II.2. The Conference recommends to the Government of the Republic of
Togo and His Excellency GNASSINGBE EYADEMA, President of the Republic
and Head Of State to kindly submit the Conference Declaration on the
Decade on Medicinal Plants and Traditional
Medicines in Africa to the attention of the forthcoming OAU Summit.
II.3. Governments, NGOs and International Agencies should take urgent
steps to support activities and strategies for Research and
Development on Medicinal Plants and
Traditional Medicine relating to addressing priority diseases in Africa
such as HIV/AIDS and Malaria.
II.4. To use existing electronic networking opportunities (e.g."
Phytomedica " worldwide emailing list) in order to promote
constructive relationships and collaboration between diverse
stakeholders and interested parties active in the field of medicinal
plants, traditional medicine and pharmacopoeia.
II.5 . African Governments in partnership with NGOs and International
Agencies should find urgent ways to support the implementation of the
recommendations and the comprehensive Regional Action Plan outlined
by the Regional Workshops on Medicinal
Plants and Traditional Medicine in Africa jointly organised by the
Environment Liaison Centre International (ELCI) and the International
Development Research Centre (IDRC) held successively on 17-21
November 1997 in Conakry, Republic of Guinea for African French
speaking countries and on 14-18 April 1998 in Cape Town, South Africa
for African English speaking countries.
II.6. To establish and convene a two year regular conference to review
progress in implementing the Programme of the Decade and to plan for
future action, focusing on
priority and specific issues and objectives.
The Nairobi Declaration:
FORMALLY RECOGNISE TRADITIONAL MEDICINE
We, the participants of the Nairobi Conference on Medicinal Plants,
Traditional Medicines and Local Communities in Africa: Challenges and
Opportunities of the New Millennium do hereby confirm our commitment to
the collective goal of Health for All through the primary health care
approach and the principles of conservation and sustainable development
outlined in the Convention of Biological Diversity.
Whereas:
· in sub-Saharan Africa in 1999, there were 6,027 deaths a day due to
the HIV/AIDS epidemic, 2,345 deaths a day due to malaria, and 8,181
deaths a day due to diarrhoea; and
· traditional medicines are often the only affordable and accessible
forms of healthcare for the majority of the African rural population;
and
· local health traditions - many of which are oral in nature and
therefore largely undocumented - are being lost; and
· traditional health systems have not been replaced by the "Western"
system because traditional healing is deeply embedded in wider belief
systems and remains an integral part of the lives of most African
people;
We, draw attention to the fact that:
· African governments have not acknowledged or built upon this
traditional knowledge resource-base, thereby making the goal of Health
for All more difficult to achieve unless these resources are mobilized
and used more effectively;
· the unsustainable, unregulated and indiscriminant harvesting of
medicinal plant species is being compounded by the very low level of
understanding of the biology and ecology of the species concerned;
· it is unlikely that social, technical or economic changes in
developing countries over the next decade will reduce significantly
the dependency of rural peoples on medicinal plants species resources;
· though there are few reliable data on global trade of medicinal plants
the loss of species would be a catastrophic blow to productivity,
balance of payments, national debt, and GDP.
We, call on the Presidents of all African countries to declare the
period 2000 - 2010 the Decade of African Traditional Medicine and commit
their governments through the appropriate ministries to:
· formally recognize the value of Traditional Health Systems alongside
modern health systems in national primary healthcare as an available
intervention option in the fight against HIV/AIDS and other
communicable diseases;
· identify compelling scientific methods to evaluate and standardize
traditional herbal remedies in order to promote their safe, effective
and affordable use;
· develop comprehensive strategies/policies for the conservation,
management and sustainability of supply of medicinal plant species;
· identify legal strategies that protect the Intellectual Property
Rights (IPR) of knowledge holders;
· formally recognize the value and contribution of ethno-veterinary
knowledge in livestock healthcare;
· establish an annual recognition week that acknowledges the important
role that women play in home healthcare through their knowledge and
use of medicinal plant species.
· work with the World Trade Organization (WTO) to identify a process
that effectively regulates the international trade of African
medicinal plant species and protects individual country's resources
and rights;
· establish a partnership of countries to protect and enhance this
aspect of African cultural heritage.
Conference Participants
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
SPEECH OF THE ENVIRONMENT AND NATURAL RESOURCES MINISTER ,HONORABLE
FRANCIS NYENZE READ BY HIMSELF FOR THE OPENING THE CONFERENCE ON 16 MAY
2000
Distinguished Participants, Ladies and Gentlemen.
I am happy to be here today to open this important conference on
Medicinal Plants, Traditional Medicines and Local Communities in
Africa: Challenges and Opportunities for the new Millennium. I take this
opportunity to welcome you all to Kenya on behalf of the Government of
Kenya.
This Conference is a parallel session to the Conference of Parties
(COP-5) to the Convention on Biodiversity (CBD) which began on Monday.
I note that the conference is being supported by various international
organizations and Donors which include the Canadian International
Development Research Centre ( IDRC), UNAIDS, Commonwealth, European
Union , United Nations Development Programme ( UNDP), and other
Agencies. On behalf of the Government of Kenya, I thank all these
agencies for their financial support of the conference.
I understand that the conference will address issues pertaining to the
Sustainable use of medicinal plants and the conservation of these
plants. This is an issue of great importance not only to Kenya but to
all nations around the world. Every year all sectors of the Kenyan
Nation participate in tree planting exercises and these events are led
by His Excellency the President of Kenya himself. I hope that your
deliberations will tackle matters concerning the rapid depletion of
flora and fauna in many parts of the developing world due to practices
that are detrimental to the continued survival of our forests. The
international trade in some of the plants such as Prunus africana and
the aloes, and in animals such as the horns of the rhino and elephant
tasks, must be viewed seriously.
I have observed that this conference will also discuss the role of
traditional medicine in our health care systems. As you will all agree,
a very significant proportion of the people in the world today has
turned to the use of traditional remedies prepared from plant or animal
materials.
Another issue which I have noted that you will be discussing is the
protection of the intellectual property rights of traditional healers
and others who have mastered the art of applying our traditional
sciences to provide alternative healing services where the modern
conventional remedies have failed. The excessive exploitation of the
indigenous knowledge of our peoples must be carefully protected.
Over the years, the importance of specific plant species for primary
health care has received some recognition from official authorities and
policy institutions. Medicinal plants deserve special attention because
they are of great value in averting or treating common illnesses.
Because of the high cost of imported drugs, many African health
ministries are now encouraging the use of local medicinal plants in
order to give underprivileged populations alternative to primary health
care, and have established departments of traditional pharmacopoeia to
implement this policy.
This acknowledgement has been extremely vital in efforts to conserve
medicinal bio-diversity. But the preservation of such plants has
depended mainly on how indigenous and local communities have treated
ecosystems in general. In fact, traditional healers have not only
directed much of their attention to plants of direct medicinal
relevance, but also to the conservation of adjoining areas where
non-medicinal species grow.
While international efforts have concentrated on issues of
bio-conservation in developing countries, no formula has been devised to
compensate local communities for the genetic resources which they helped
to conserve and which have had significant pharmaceutical spin-off for
industrialized countries.
In Africa, more than 80% of the continent's population relies on plant
and animal-based medicines to meet their health care requirements. As
Africa's population grows, demand for traditional medicines will
increase, and pressure on natural resources will become greater than
ever.
We expect that your deliberations will address the following priorities
pertaining to the issues highlighted above:
1. Strategies and mechanisms initiating and implementing an African
decade devoted to development and promotion of medicinal plants
,traditional medicine and pharmacopoeia;
2.Outline of an African wide agenda and process for development of the
sector;
3.The need for the Biodiversity Convention processes to reflect
specifically, medicinal plants and traditional medicine and protection
of customary Intellectual property rights;
4. Activities and strategies for Research and Development relating to
addressing priority diseases using medicinal plants and traditional
medicine.
Ladies and gentlemen, the current pandemics of HIV/AIDS and Malaria have
raised very important questions on the utilisation of our indigenous
remedies. As you all know, the Commonwealth Heads of State met in
Durban, South Africa in November 1999 to declare HIV/AIDS a national
disaster in Africa. Last month, the African heads of state also met in
Abuja Nigeria to deliberate on strategies for eliminating the scourge of
Malaria.
It has often been said that Nature has a unique way of providing the
solution for treatment near where disease conditions occur. If this
supposition is true, then indeed we must find the treatment for HIV/AIDS
and Malaria among our vast flora and fauna.
In conclusion, ladies and gentlemen, I believe that it is possible to
use modern science and technology to seek among our vast biodiversity
remedies for our current pandemics. In this effort, I exhort you to
leave no stone unturned, but rational and sustainable methods should be
applied.
Once again, I welcome you all, and I invite especially those of you
coming from outside Kenya to enjoy our hospitality. Take the
opportunity to visit the National Parks and enjoy the our wildlife and
biodiversity in general.
And, with great pleasure, I declare this Regional Conference on
Medicinal Plants, Traditional Medicines and Local Communities in
Africa,officially open.
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