Advanced Search

Journal Navigation

Journal Home

Subscriptions

Archive

Contact Us

Table of Contents

Click here for more information

Sign In to gain access to subscriptions and/or personal tools.
The Journal of Environment & Development
This Article
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow References
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to Saved Citations
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Right arrow Request Reprints
Right arrow Add to My Marked Citations
Citing Articles
Right arrow Citing Articles via Google Scholar
Right arrow Citing Articles via Scopus
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Clapp, R. A.
Right arrow Articles by Crook, C.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Complore   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us   Add to Digg   Add to Reddit   Add to Technorati   Add to Twitter  
What's this?

Drowning in the Magic Well: Shaman Pharmaceuticals and the Elusive Value of Traditional Knowledge

Roger Alex Clapp

Simon Fraser University in British Columbia.

Carolyn Crook

Environment Canada.

Biodiversity prospecting, and ethnobotanical search methods that draw on the medicinal knowledge of traditional societies, are mechanisms of drug discovery with the potential to reward the conservers of biological resources. Shaman Pharmaceuticals aspired to be a model of ethnobotanical bioprospecting, discovering new medicines while sharing benefits with indigenous people. Shaman's failure to market any new pharmaceutical products and its ultimate bankruptcy were heralded as marking the failure, and future abandonment, of ethnobotanical bioprospecting. This analysis of Shaman's history suggests that risks inherent in drug development, company risk associated with Shaman's drug development strategy, and technological change in the industry all contributed to its failure. The authors examine the opportunities and constraints encountered in bioprospecting and ethnobotanical searches and argue that natural products will remain important to drug development. Technological change, however, means that new models and new institutional structures are required for drug development based on natural products.

The Journal of Environment & Development, Vol. 11, No. 1, 79-102 (2002)
DOI: 10.1177/107049650201100104
Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Complore Complore   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us   Add to Digg Digg   Add to Reddit Reddit   Add to Technorati Technorati   Add to Twitter Twitter    What's this?