Accra, March 10, GNA - Ghana is developing policy guidelines for the handling of genetic resources and traditional knowledge, Dr Gladys Ashitey, a Deputy Minister of Health said on Monday.

She said the policy guidelines, which would give special references to their application in health and agriculture, would also focus on the documentation of traditional knowledge and the related genetic resources, conditions of access, benefit sharing arrangements, institutional arrangements for administration and enforcement.

Speaking at the opening of the second Global Summit on HIV and AIDS, Traditional Medicine and Indigenous Knowledge in Accra, the Deputy Minister said the guidelines would help foster research and development, innovations and capacity building for optimal and sustainable use of traditional knowledge and plant genetic resources.

She said the guidelines would promote public awareness and facilitate advocacy for the development of traditional knowledge and sustainable use and conservation of plant genetic resources.

The five-day international workshop, attended by over participants mainly traditional medicine practitioners, traditional healers and policy makers across the world would be discussing, among other things, identifying the challenges, successes and failures of indigenous healing in the contemporary world.

They will also discuss assessing best practices in establishing the value of any traditional medicine regarding its efficacy, safety and quality and resolving the differences in concepts and methodologies regarding best practices.

Dr. Ashitey explained that the institutional, research and administrative framework as well as regulatory capacities in the country, which were being developed, had a functional Traditional Medicine Practice Council and two pilot centres for the public practice of herbal medicine in health care delivery.

"The human resource is ready with completion of the internship of 10 B Sc. Herbal Medicine graduates and availability of the selected herbal medicine products."

She called for the collaboration of herbal practitioners and the government to move herbal medicine forward.

Dr Ossy M. J. Kasilo, World Health Organisation (WHO) Africa Regional Office Advisor on Traditional Medicine, commended Ghana for being the first in Africa to develop a strategic plan for the development of traditional medicine.

She said Ghana was also the first in developing traditional medicine research plant at the Centre for Plant Medicine, developing Code of Ethics in traditional medicine among other achievements and urged other countries participating in the workshop to follow Ghana's example.

Answering a participant's question on whether traditional medicine could cure HIV virus, Dr Kasilo explained that research has disclosed traditional medicine could reduce the viral load to a point where it will be difficult for the CD 4 Count machine to detect the virus. She said there was evidence of some HIV patients who had been on traditional medicine gain weight, but added they "cannot compare ARV to traditional medicine and traditional medicine cannot replace ARV until further research is conducted on that".

Mr Kwame Amezah, Acting Director of Extension of the Ministry of Food and Agriculture, said the current forests covering about four billion hectares were very important for the promotion of health. "Unfortunately the forests are being converted to other activities such as mining, agriculture and oil production resulting in long term reduction of provision of forest products and services as well as potential of the forest to regenerate itself." He called for the need for scientists to study the forest ecosystem in order to generate vital information and knowledge necessary for sustaining the forest growth and use.