Neelam Biotech, an Indian company, imports seeds of a plant from Peru to carry out commercial research…

Section 36A, inserted in 2023, lets the Central Government authorise the NBA to monitor and regulate in India "the access and utilisation of biological resources obtained from a foreign country". Rule 18 requires a user of such resources to "submit a declaration in Form 10", and the NBA then notifies the ABS Clearing-House of the Convention on Biological Diversity. The view that the Act covers only Indian resources ignores this user-country measure, which supports the Nagoya Protocol.