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Trying to Protect Something More Precious Than Gold
Fri Jul 16, 2004 09:52 AM ET
By Ed Stoddard
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - Southern African countries are seeking to restrict trade in a rare plant hungrily sought by drug companies for its appetite-suppressing properties, a government official said on Friday.
The Hoodia cactus has been used for thousands of years by southern Africa's San Bushmen to dampen their appetites during long treks through the harsh Kalahari desert and holds the key to potentially lucrative anti-obesity drugs.
South Africa's Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) has patented the chemical entity extracted from Hoodia and licensed British drugs-from-plants firm Phytopharm Plc to develop the plant's commercial potential.
South Africa, Botswana and Namibia have proposed giving Hoodia an Appendix II listing at October's meeting of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) in Bangkok.
Trade in species listed on Appendix II "must be controlled in order to avoid utilization incompatible with their survival," according to CITES regulations.
"By putting it on Appendix II we will have control over the amount of plants that leave South Africa," Sonja Meintjes, assistant director trade and regulation at South Africa's department of environmental affairs and tourism, told Reuters.
Inclusion in Appendix II normally means that trade can only be done with a CITES permit and would therefore make previous permits null and void.
Phytopharm said it was confident of being granted a CITES permit and welcomed moves to protect Hoodia.
"This strengthens our position substantially by making the unauthorized exportation of Hoodia illegal, rather than merely naughty," Chief Executive Richard Dixey told Reuters in a telephone interview.
"We would have a CITES permit because it is actually issued by the governments. We are the patent holder and we are working very closely with the South African government and we are in discussions with the Namibian government, for example," he said.
Phytopharm is in talks to license an appetite suppressant derived from Hoodia to a major food company.
San Bushmen organizations have said they hope to share in any profits derived from the drug.
"We would like to see the communities where the plants are harvested benefit," said Meintjes.
REUTERS
(Additional reporting by Mark Potter and Lara Smith in London)
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