Access & Benefit Sharing

International level activities

Since 2004, Bioversity International has made technical contributions to the  negotiations of the international regime on access and benefit-sharing to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD  [1]). The Nagoya Protocol  [2] was finally adopted by the Conference of the Parties at it's Tenth Meeting (COP10  [3]), Nagoya, Japan, on 29 October 2010. Read more  [4].

Working on behalf of the CGIAR, through the System-wide Genetic Resources Programme (SGRP  [5]), Bioversity’s contributions have taken the form of oral interventions, a targeted series of policy briefs  and numerous panel presentations to delegates.

In this context, Bioversity has worked to raise negotiators’ awareness of the importance of:

The policy briefs are available below:

Meanwhile the FAO Commission on Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (CGRFA  [12]) has also started considering ABS issues as they relate to food and agriculture. To make the most of this opportunity, Bioversity and other CGIAR Centres have contributed to a specialized body of literature, dedicated to getting the most relevant facts in front of delegates who have responsibility for developing appropriate ABS norms. These papers concern patterns of exchange and use of different subsets of GRFA, and the impact of climate change on countries’ interdependence on GRFA:

These same papers have also been provided, by the CBD Secretariat, to delegates negotiating the protocol. Beyond the sharing of information between these two international bodies, it is not clear yet how fruits of the ABS work of these two bodies will relate. Bioversity will continue to make contributions to both, in the hopes that they will eventually settle on a coordinated series of activities, including focused consideration of options for ABS for GRFA. The first meeting of the Committee for the Nagoya Protocol  [17] was held in Montreal, June 2011.

A third ongoing international process to which Bioversity and the CGIAR Centres dedicate considerable attention concerns the implementation of the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture  [18]. See also The Treaty’s multilateral system of access and benefit-sharing  [19] and The Treaty and the CGIAR Centres  [20]. 
 

National level activities

Bioversity has been involved in a number of projects with national partners concerning access and benefit-sharing.  One example is the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations/Treaty Secretariat/Bioversity International Joint Programme to assist countries build their capacity to implement the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture.  [21] This programme has been welcomed by the Governing Body of the Treaty.

Other ABS related Bioversity publications concerning national policy making include the following:

Similar posts:

Filed under: Policy & Law  [27]See also: Access & Benefits  [28], Ex situ Conservation  [29], International Treaty  [30], ITPGRFA  [31], Policy & Law  [32]

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