STAND. COM. REP. NO. 112

Honolulu, Hawaii

, 2005

RE: H.B. No. 247

H.D. 1

 

 

 

Honorable Calvin K.Y. Say

Speaker, House of Representatives

Twenty-Third State Legislature

Regular Session of 2005

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committees on Energy & Environmental Protection, Water, Land, & Ocean Resources, and Hawaiian Affairs, to which was referred H.B. No. 247 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO BIOPROSPECTING,"

beg leave to report as follows:

The purpose of this bill is to:

(1) Safeguard the public interest in biological resources by prohibiting the exclusive possession of, or conveyance of rights, interest, and title to, biological resources identified on or collected from public lands, except under certain circumstances; and

(2) Establish a temporary Bioprospecting Advisory Commission (Commission) to develop a comprehensive plan for the preservation and use of biological diversity and resources on public lands, and appropriate an unspecified amount of funds for the Commission.

The University of Hawaii (UH), Hawaii Chapter of the Sierra Club, Oahu Council of the Association of Hawaiian Civic Clubs, Women's Coalition, Hawaii State Coalition Against Domestic Violence, and six concerned citizens supported this bill. The UH Environmental Center supported the intent of this bill. The Department of Agriculture opposed this measure. The Hawaii Agriculture Research Center and the Hawaii Crop Improvement Association offered comments.

Your Committees find that the patenting of a life form was not an issue until the United States Supreme Court allowed the patenting of life in 1980. With that decision, private interests were given the right to own every non-human life form on earth.

Article XI, section 1, of the State Constitution provides that "[a]ll public natural resources are held in trust by the State for the benefit of the people." Hawaii's biological diversity and biological resources are assets of the public trust and could yield potentially graet economic benefits in the areas of medicine, scientific research, biotechnology, and commercial development.

The development of a public policy is necessary if there is to be fair and equitable sharing of the benefits arising from research, intellectual property knowledge, or application of biological resources that are public natural resources held in trust by the State for the benefit of the people. Such a policy should give interested parties, such as the University of Hawaii and the biotechnology industry, regulatory certainty with respect to the commercial development of Hawaii's rich biological resources.

Your Committees have amended this measure by:

(1) Deleting the Commission;

(2) Requiring the Legislative Reference Bureau (LRB), in consultation with various organizations, agencies, and individuals, to conduct a study to assist in the formation of public policies for the commercial development of the State's biological resources in an environmentally sustainable, culturally sensitive, and economically feasible manner that is mutually beneficial to all the people of the state;

(3) Requiring the Attorney General to assist LRB with the study;

(4) Clarifying that research, and joint research or commercial development agreements entered into by the State that involve permitted or research operations whose products are neither indigenous nor endemic to the State shall not be prohibited, inhibited, or restricted by the prohibition on exclusive possession or conveyance of biological resources;

(5) Prohibiting UH from entering into material transfer agreements that transfer title and ownership of the state's natural, biological, and genetic resources to any private entity unless expressly authorized by the Legislature through a Concurrent Resolution adopted by both houses;

(6) Increasing the scope of this bill by expanding the

definition of "public lands" to include those lands excluded under the definition of "public lands" in the Management and Disposition of Public Lands law; and

(7) Making technical, nonsubstantive amendments for style and clarity.

Your Committees find that LRB is the institution that will most appropriately carry out the impartial research needed for the study requested by this bill.

As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Energy & Environmental Protection, Water, Land, & Ocean Resources, and Hawaiian Affairs that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of H.B. No. 247, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as H.B. No. 247, H.D. 1, and be referred to the Committees on Economic Development & Business Concerns and Agriculture.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Energy & Environmental Protection, Water, Land, & Ocean Resources, and Hawaiian Affairs,

 

____________________________

EZRA R. KANOHO, Chair

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HERMINA MORITA, Chair

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SCOTT K. SAIKI, Chair