Emma Sue Jones

Conservation Ecology and Ethnobotany

Academic Advisor: Kim Landsbergen
Co-op Advisor: Rick Kraince

Co-ops: Hanging Co-op for Fall of 2022
Additional Campus Involvement: Performed ethnobotanical research for and was affiliated with the organization of the reinstatement of the Native Medicinal Herb Garden on Antioch College Campus in conjunction with professor Rick Kraince and several current students (Summer 2021, Pennell House).

Languages: English and French (learning Spanish)

City: Yellow Springs

Email: ejones@antiochcollege.edu
 

Biopiracy of the Kakadu Plum (Terminalia ferdinandiana), Australia: A Literature Review

The purpose of this literary review is to describe and investigate the environmental crime of the biopiracy of the Kakadu Plum (“Terminalia ferdinandiana”), a historical food source and medicinal botanical species for some of the indigenous nations of Australia. Biopiracy refers to “the use of biological resources and/or knowledge of indigenous tribes or communities without allowing them to share the revenues generated out of economic exploitation” of that indigenous resource or traditional knowledge (after Efferth et al. 2016). This literature review aims to find and summarize other biopiracy cases similar to that of the Kakadu Plum. In this review, the  implications of biopiracy crimes are presented, including: respective threats to biodiversity, historic aboriginal use and spiritual reverence of the Kakadu Plum, and controversies surrounding the specifics of sharing the Kakadu Plum and its suspected health benefits globally. In addition, my project explored the violation of indigenous land rights and the appropriation of indigenous intellectual property by multinational companies and corporations, and offers possible solutions to biopiracy while advocating for justice.