NEW DELHI: The United States-based multinationals, Wal-Mart and Monsanto, are on the board of the Indo-U.S. Knowledge Initiative on Agriculture Research and Education. It will set the agenda for collaborative farm research with Indian laboratories and agricultural universities.

In India, the universities on their own and through Krishi Vigyan Kendras serve as extension agencies for farmers on the field and have a wide reach.

At the first meeting of the board in Washington DC in December 2005, representatives of the Wal-Mart food chain and the Monsanto Seed Corporation were keen on using the Initiative for retailing in agriculture and in trade aspects. Transgenic research in crops, animals and fisheries would be a substantial part of the collaboration in biotechnology, requiring India to pledge huge funds.

Issues of Intellectual Property Rights and Benefit-Sharing were also discussed. India is endowed with rich biodiversity and has a huge bank of germ plasm and genetic resource material in the public research system. India is looking for joint ownership or joint patents, whereas in the U.S. much of the transgenic and hybrid agricultural technology is with the corporates.

Mangala Rai, Director-General of the Indian Council of Agriculture Research, is the co-chair of the Board along with Ellen Terpstra, Administrator of the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Foreign Agriculture Services. There will be seven members from each side.

Only private funding

According to well-placed sources, the American side clearly told the Indians that there will be no U.S. government funding. In their university system, research is funded by the private sector, which will then hold the patent on a technology. Even technologies developed with public funds are licensed to corporates.

But India will have to pay even the "tuition fee" to scientists who visit America for "capacity building" and training. It is also expected to allocate up to Rs. 400 crore over three years towards the Initiative. Of this, about Rs. 300 crore will be for research in transgenic and biotechnology.

The sources said this came as a jolt to scientists, who were looking for a yesteryear kind of development and application-oriented collaboration and technology dissemination with substantial U.S. funding.

But for the appointment of a Joint Secretary on the board, the Agriculture Ministry has virtually no direct role. Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia is directly and closely involved in the Initiative.

After considering a 56-page Indian draft proposal, the board identified four major priority areas: human resource and institutional capacity building; agri-processing and marketing; emerging technologies and natural resources management.

The Indian side had sought priority collaboration in climate change, soil and waste management, IPR, biosafety, food safety, regulatory frameworks, post-harvest management, value addition, food marketing, product handling, nanotechnology, vaccines and diagnostics and precision farming.

But the board agreed only on four areas in the short-term: education, learning resources, curriculum development and training; food processing and use of bioproducts and biofuels; biotechnology and water management. Preparations are on to finalise a work plan next week, in time for a formal announcement by U.S. President George Bush when he arrives in India.

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