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Rodrigo de la Cruz

Rodrigo de la Cruz, a member of the Call of the Earth Steering Committee, is Kichwa from Ecuador. He previously served as the Assessor for oil, biodiversity, traditional knowledge and intellectual property policies of the Coordinating Body of the Indigenous Organizations of the Amazon Basin (COICA).

Rodrigo has served on many official international delegations including as:

• an international observer from Ecuador in the United Nations Mission for Guatemala (MINUGUA) for the Agreement on the Identity and Rights of Indigenous Peoples;
  
• an expert indigenous delegate from Ecuador to the meetings of the Panel of Experts on Access and Benefit Sharing, in San Jose, Costa Rica and Montreal, Canada;
  
• an indigenous observer at the 3rd, 4th and 5th Conferences of the Parties to the Conventional on Biological Diversity (CBD)and its Working Groups on Access and Benefit Sharing and Traditional Knowledge Article 8j;
  
• an expert observer at the 6th and 7th sessions of the Intergovernmental Committee on Intellectual Property and Genetic Resources, Traditional Knowledge and Folklore at the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO).

Rodrigo has also been appointed by the United Nations as an indigenous expert to discuss Methodologies regarding Free Prior and Informed Consent, a useful decision-making tool guiding discussions at the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues in activities relating to indigenous peoples.

Within the Andean Integration System (Andean Community), he was Regional Coordinator for Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia. As member of the Indigenous Expert Group on Traditional Knowledge, Rodrigo participated in the draft of a document for the Andean Decision for the Protection of Indigenous Peoples' Traditional Knowledge.

At present, Rodrigo is a national consultant for the Ministry of the Environment in the Republic of Ecuador and the ECOLEX Foundation - Environmental Management and Law Corporation. He is working on the formulation of the Regulations for the Preservation and Utilization of Mountain Ecosystems.

Rodrigo co-authored the book Biodiversity, Collective Rights and Sui Generis Management in Intellectual Property. He is a member of technical working groups on the Elaboration of a National Strategy on Biodiversity in Ecuador and the Regional Strategy on Biodiversity in the Andean Community of Nations (CAN).

Rodrigo holds a Masters in Public Science and Law.

Rodrigo de La Cruz (Ecuador) Photo:COE