Hoffman, 2005 – Research and investment in poultry genetic resources – challenges and options for sustainable use

The global poultry sector is divided into a large-scale commercial sub-sector dominated by international, vertically integrated companies, and a small-scale subsector that provides up to 90 percent of total poultry production in some of the least developed countries. The fast reproduction cycle, low unit costs, economies of scale in research and appropriation, and control of the produce are driving factors in the commercial sector. Private research concentrates on technologies that are likely to result in market applications and returns to investment. Private incentives for animal research are strongest where markets for improved technology are large, technical advances can be made quickly, and intellectual property can be protected. To date, technological protection strategies and contractual practices, rather than formal intellectual property rights strategies, have dominated in the commercial poultry sector. Poultry breeding companies have developed a highly successful way of protecting their intellectual property investment in superior breeds by exploiting heterosis, and the deleterious segregation of hybrid stocks in the next generation. Thus, by restricting access to the pure parent line stock (a form of trade secret) and by selling F1 generation birds, a breeding company remains the sole supplier of useful material. Patents do not yet play a role in poultry breeding, but breeding for disease resistance might change this in the future.
This paper explores the flow of poultry genetic material between developed and developing countries, investments in the poultry sector in developing countries, and economic and legal issues involved. In terms of genetic resources, the main questions concern how the division in the poultry sector affects the full portfolio of poultry genetic resources and if this division has an impact on the traditional small-scale subsector. The analysis is based on country reports to the First Report on the State of the World’s Animal Genetic Resources process, studies on flow of genetic material and commercial transactions, and genetic distancing.