Over a dozen cases, pending with the National Green Tribunal (NGT)'s Bhopal bench in Madhya Pradesh (MP) for more than two years, have been disposed of after the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF)'s recent notification on access to biological resources and benefits sharing (ABS) which came into effect from November 21, 2014.

NGT which was until now awaiting a clear-cut and well-defined guideline on ABS disposed of the cases recently, according to sources. In 2012, several Ayush companies had moved courts when Madhya Pradesh State Biodiversity Board (MPSBB) asked them to deposit the stipulated amount on benefit sharing as per the Biological Diversity (BD) Act.

Explains Dr R G Soni, former member secretary, MPSBB, "Cases were pending at NGT for final order, awaiting the recently notified guidelines on benefit sharing. Due to lack of uniform benefit sharing guidelines, which is now notified, boards of all the states were losing Rs.25,000 crore every year since 2004. Similarly, NBA was also losing Rs.10,000 crore every year since 2004. "

Dr Soni is credited to have initiated the action during his tenure at MPSBB following which companies moved to NGT. However, NGT approved the actions taken by MPSBB finally.

The notification on ABS empowers respective state biodiversity boards to determine the amount of benefit sharing to be given by Ayush manufacturers to the state exchequer.

State biodiversity boards have hailed the notification as a welcome change as it will notify uniform rules thus allowing them to collect from domestic and foreign companies a certain percentage of their ex-factory gross sales of products using biological resources and traditional knowledge.

As per the notification, when the biological resources are accessed for commercial utilisation or the bio-survey and bio-utilisation leads to commercial utilisation, the applicants shall have the option to pay the benefit sharing ranging from 0.1 to 0.5 per cent at the following graded percentages of the annual gross ex-factory sale of the product which shall be worked out based on the annual gross ex-factory sale minus government taxes.

As per the Biological Diversity Act, 2002, an Ayush manufacturer has the responsibility to share details of the source from where the raw material has been procured and also a certain per cent of the revenue generated out of the production for its sustainable use.

In order to implement the act, state biodiversity boards across the country had started issuing notices to the Ayush manufacturers not registered with them, a few months ago, directing them to do so at the earliest.

According to Section 7 and 24(2) of the Act, organisations extracting plant-based material for commercial purpose without intimation to state biodiversity board are liable under Section 55(2) of the Act and shall be punishable with imprisonment which may extend up to three years with fine or five years with fine or both.

Till date, over 34, 000 Biodiversity Management Committees (BMCs) and 28 State Biodiversity Boards (SBBs) have been set up under Section 22(2) of the Act across the country. Local bodies have constituted the BMCs in respective states as per Section 41 of the act. BMCs also prepare, maintain and validate People’s Biodiversity Register (PBR) in consultation with the local people. PBR gives information about the details of biological resources and traditional knowledge.