Therefore it should be understood that when indigenous peoples are referring to their intellectual property rights that they are being inclusive of their cultural property rights as well. Indigenous peoples have a number of concerns with current intellectual property laws. Intellectual property rights require that individual or joint authorship be clearly established before protection will be granted. In indigenous societies it is not always possible to establish ownership of traditional knowledge or to determine who created cultural works. Traditional knowledge or cultural works are more likely to have been created over many generations and are deemed to be owned collectively by the tribal or family group.
Limited protection allows the limitation of the scope and length of monopolies.
Indigenous peoples do not subscribe to this view as they believe that they are the guardians of their property for future generations. Once the protection period of intellectual property rights legislation lapsed there would be no guarantees that the intellectual and cultural property would remain in the domain of indigenous peoples. Self-determination Indigenous peoples wish to define the scope and nature of their intellectual and cultural property and to have their definitions recognised by governments, industry and key international organisations such as the United Nations. In New Zealand, Maori have based the exertion of their intellectual and cultural property rights on the guarantees made in the Treaty of Waitangi which was signed by Maori and representatives of the British Crown in 1840. The claim relates to the ownership of indigenous flora and fauna and that the Crown has denied Maori proprietary interests by granting plant variety rights in relation to indigenous flora and permitting and encouraging extensive land clearance and habitat destruction, which has detrimentally affected indigenous species.