The history of the Nagoya Protocol [1], a pivotal international agreement, can be traced back to the late 20th century. It finds its roots in the initiatives of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) which, in 1988, established a working group of Experts on Biological Diversity that laid the groundwork for future developments in environmental conservation and the sustainable use of biodiversity [2].
A landmark moment in this journey occurred on 5 June 1992, during the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro. This date marked the opening for signature of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), a comprehensive multinational agreement addressing biological diversity [2]. The significance of 1992 is profound as it established a temporal threshold; actions and acquisitions of biological resources prior to that year are distinguished from those that occurred thereafter under the new international legal framework provided by the CBD.
Following the establishment of the CBD, two critical protocols were developed, each addressing different aspects of biodiversity management. The first was the Cartagena Protocol, adopted in 2000, focusing on biosafety. It emphasizes the safe handling, transfer, and use of living modified organisms resulting from modern biotechnology, ensuring they do not adversely affect biological diversity or human health [3].
The second and equally significant protocol is the Nagoya Protocol, adopted in 2010 (Table 1). This protocol specifically deals with access to genetic resources and the fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from their utilization (access and benefit-sharing, ABS) [1]. The Nagoya Protocol underscores the importance of recognizing and compensating the contributions of indigenous and local communities who have conserved and sustainably used biodiversity, including the maintenance of traditional knowledge associated with genetic resources. This Protocol partly emerged in response to historical practices, particularly in the medicinal industry, in which commercial entities often exploited natural and indigenous resources without fair compensation. These practices included using local knowledge to identify plants with medicinal properties, commercializing the derived products, and not adequately sharing the benefits with the communities or countries of origin [4]. Interestingly, one of the very active countries in paving the way for the Nagoya protocol was Ethiopia and the motivation of Ethiopian authorities was what Lemma and Maryo [5] named the “monumental biological theft” of Ethiopian national heritage crops, citing explicitly coffee (Coffea arabica) as an example [5].
The Nagoya Protocol officially came into force in October 2014, signifying a major step forward in the global commitment to biodiversity conservation and sustainable use [1]. The parties to the Nagoya Protocol, similar to those of the Cartagena Protocol [3] and the CBD [2], are national governments that have ratified the agreement. Information about the member states of these protocols is readily available on the United Nations website, providing transparency and accountability [6].
It is noteworthy that some major countries, like the United States of America (USA), are not parties to the Nagoya Protocol [6], but may still generally support the principles of ABS [7]. For example, the University of California was described to have adopted the Nagoya Protocol as best practice when dealing with biological resources [8].
The coffee sector is facing challenges, including climate change [9,10,11,12,13], which has been well-documented [9,14,15]. Farming systems are already transitioning towards agroforestry [16,17,18,19], but a significant part of the solution will undoubtedly be genetic [20,21,22]. Coffea arabica is one of the most genetically narrow cultivated species [23,24], primarily due to drastic bottlenecks during its evolution [25,26]. Furthermore, recent research has revealed that certain genetic populations of the C. arabica species, located in South Sudan [27], Yemen [28,29,30], and the Hararghe region of Ethiopia [30], have not been fully utilized due to their previous unknown status. It is important to note that the use of these genetic resources outside of their center of origin may fall under the Nagoya Protocol, as well as any genetic resources that have yet to be explored in Southern Ethiopia. C. canephora is a potential replacement for C. arabica in regions where the latter species is no longer viable. The genetic diversity of C. canephora is vast [31], but only a small portion of it has been studied [32,33,34]. Overcoming specific challenges associated with C. canephora, such as cup quality, will require the extensive use of genetic resources found in various West and Central African countries. The Nagoya framework will be significant in this context. Additionally, it is worth noting that C. arabica and C. canephora are just two of the 130 species in the Coffea genus. Some of these species have been identified as potential solutions to the challenges posed by climate change [35,36,37,38,39]. These species, which have potential interest, are found in various African countries and will require significant agronomic research in the future.
Conserving the unique genetic diversity of coffee is crucial for the resilience and sustainability of the global coffee industry, given the challenges it faces. Therefore, it is important for the coffee community to be aware of the Nagoya Protocol and conduct research within its framework.
The aim of this article is not to provide an exhaustive review of all the provisions of the Nagoya Protocol, but rather to describe them sufficiently to raise awareness within the coffee community. The authors propose the creation of a discussion forum within the industry, potentially under the International Coffee Organization, to coordinate research practices and the exchange of coffee genetic resources worldwide.