The Ministry of Law and Justice (MoL&J) on August 03, 2023, notified the Biological Diversity (Amendment) Act, 2023 further to amend the Biological Diversity Act, 2002. The amendments are as follows: In section 2 for clause (a), the following clauses shall be substituted, namely:— ‘(a) “access” means collecting, procuring or possessing any biological resource occurring in or obtained from India or traditional knowledge associated thereto, for the purposes of research or bio-survey or commercial utilization (aa) “benefit claimers” means the conservers of biological resources, their by-products, creators or holders of traditional knowledge associated thereto (excluding codified traditional knowledge only for Indians) and information relating to the use of such biological resources, innovations, and practices associated with such use and application. In section 3 sub-section (2), in clause (c), for sub-clause (ii), the following sub-clause shall be substituted, namely: — “(ii) incorporated or registered in India under any law for the time being in force, which is controlled by a foreigner within the meaning of clause (27) of section 2 of the Companies Act, 2013.
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