prior story by lemberthe regis from germany

The scheme is simple yet remains unknown : traditional knowledge that has been developed amongst rural communities are being patented by outsiders, thus depriving its inventors of any right - be it selling it or even using it. When applied to agriculture, this scheme becomes overly dangerous, most often leading to hunger.
As keeping this knowledge secret has become impossible, the answer to that 'biopiracy' lies in official disclosure; doing so, one creates a 'prior act', a proof of existence, making future patents illegal.

+++PRIOR STORY uses regular (fair-) trade circuits to disseminate information. Every agricultural product which cultivation is based on traditional knowledge is accompanied by the story of this technique, along with a serial number based on the geographical region and the type of product. in addition to protecting knowledge, PRIOR STORY has a didactic objective towards European consumers.

+++The PRIOR POSTCARD takes advantage of the continuous flow of information that results from tourism. Every postcard is printed with a local story, and a sample of product is being slipped inside it - a few lentels, a dried mango... The link between consumer, producer and product is therefore made stronger through a personal experience - travelling.

+++PRIOR WEB constitutes the official platform which both PRIOR STORY ans PRIOR POSTCARD link to. There are gathered, and made accessible to anyone, all the stories - in written but also audio format, the technique being explained by the cultivator himself.

+++Here are two stories I could gather while working on this project:

+++1. My name is Huangpu Fang, I am a chinese mango cultivator in the Shanxi province. In order to protect my trees from insects, I use an ancient technique which involves a plant called "wo cai". It has been developed during the Jin dynasty from the hybridization of celery and lettuce. It is very offensive to insects, even to snakes ; they are blinded if they circle and touch it by mistake. This allows me to get constant harvests, in which every fruit is intact.

+++2. My name is Tapia Núñez, I am a female farmer from Perú. I grow diverse plants such as coffee, grape, citrus and kapok cotton, using traditional Inca techniques. My ancestors discovered, and developed as an agricultural technique, the relationship between different trees forming the canopy ; following their teaching I grew my Citrus trees under the coverage of the taller Cercopia tree, which retains water during drier times.