All I would say is that the World Intellectual Property Organization has been studying the issue. It's called traditional knowledge, and the reason it creates somewhat of a legal issue is that traditional knowledge often isn't expressed in a way that can be copied. As you say, it's handed down from generation to generation, and the feeling is that it's owned by the community rather than by an individual. Obviously our act should address that at some point, but I think more importantly that we need an international treaty or understanding of how that would be dealt with. Unfortunately, it's not something that I think we can do on our own.
I would encourage the government to be very involved in traditional knowledge on an international scale.