The Social Value of Biodiversity for R&D |
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Authors: | Timo Goeschl Timothy Swanson |
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Institution: | (1) Department of Land Economy, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, CB3 9EP, UK;(2) Faculty of Law, Department of Economics and CSERGE, University College London, London, W1C 6BT, UK |
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Abstract: | The value of genetic resources for use in research and development (R&D)activities has been the subject of a literature modelling
the activity as onewhere individual firms engage in optimal search. Here we develop a moregeneralised framework in which genetic
resources are used in R&D at thebase of an industry that addresses recurring problems of resistance, as inthe pharmaceutical
or plant breeding industries. The R&D process is onein which firms are engaging in a continuing contest of innovation againsta
background of both creative destruction (Schumpeterian competition) andadaptive destruction (natural selection and adaptation).
This frameworkdemonstrates that the search model is conceptually inadequate because itfails to incorporate the important dynamic
characteristics of biologicalphenomena. We then demonstrate the important differences between firm-based valuation of genetic
resources and the social value of geneticresources for use in this contest of innovation. There are six externalitiesin private
patent-based genetic resource valuation, and five of theseindicate that private valuations will under-estimate social values. |
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Keywords: | biodiversity genetic resources research and development |
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