Genetic resources policies and institutions have an impact on the sustainable use and conservation of agricultural and forest biodiversity. They affect how national governments, research organizations, companies and farmers conserve and manage agricultural biodiversity, and how some of its components, like genetic resources, are made available and exchanged between different users.
Bioversity International's research approach
Research into the effects of institutions and policies is essential to identify mechanisms that help farmers make the most out of crop diversity, and to maintain a dynamic flow of genetic resources among a range of users – breeders, researchers and farmers – for climate change adaptation and the sustainable intensification of agricultural production systems.
Using participatory research methods, Bioversity International works to strengthen the capacity of our partners to conduct policy research, and to proactively engage in policy development processes by developing science-based technical contributions for consideration by policymakers from local to global levels.
Our work has a direct effect and application for: farming communities; community, national and international genebanks; local, national and international policymakers; non-governmental organizations; and researchers from national and international organizations.
Research highlights
Decision-making tool helps countries adapt to climate change
Distilled from eight years of working with countries to implement the Plant Treaty, a new decision-making tool will help all countries craft suitable instruments to let them take full advantage of the multilateral system of access and benefit sharing.
The tool is available in English, French, Spanish and Arabic.
Scenarios for Nagoya Protocol and Plant Treaty
The scenarios presented in this publication are designed to help national focal points, competent authorities and other stakeholders work through areas of uncertainty, so that they can develop clearly articulated, mutually supportive, national level approaches to implementing the Plant Treaty and the Nagoya Protocol.
The publication is available in English, French, Spanish, Arabic, Russian.
Helping policy catch up with science
When it comes to the use of plant diversity, science is way ahead of policy. Bioversity International took part in a deep analysis of the difficulties, to guide policy regime changes that will strengthen access and benefit sharing.
Mutual implementation of the Plant Treaty and the Nagoya Protocol
With the increasing effects from climate change, the need to find and exchange crops and varieties that can grow in different climatic conditions is essential. In fact many major staple food crops are already experiencing significant climate-change related yield reductions – the International Panel on Climate Change predicts that agricultural production will decline by 2% every decade until 2050, with yields of major crops in Africa and South Asia declining by up to 8%.
Recent research shows that more than two-thirds of the crops that underpin national diets originate from somewhere else.
At the international level, the majority of our work focuses on the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture. and the Convention on Biological Diversity's Nagoya Protocol - two international agreements on how countries exchange plant genetic resources.
Bioversity International is also heavily focused on working with national partners to find ways to implement both agreements in mutually supportive ways.
Farmers' Crop Varieties and Farmers' Rights
Over the last 50 years there has been a growing appreciation of the important role that farmers play in the development and conservation of crop genetic diversity, and the contribution of that crop diversity to agro-ecosystem resilience and food security.
This new book examines policies that aim to increase the share of benefits that farmers receive when others use the crop varieties they have developed and managed.
News
Community seedbank workshop unites representatives from around the world
Earlier this fall, International Workshop on Community Seedbanks attracted a truly international and diverse crowd: almost 100 farmers, experts,...
A fresh look at crop seeds for healthy diets
As we get ready for World Food Day, researcher Jacob van Etten reminds us that seeds are a central piece of our food systems, as the vehicles that...
Achieving complementarity between informal and formal seed systems
As a contribution to efforts towards achieving complementarity between the informal and formal seed systems, the Global Forum on Agricultural Research...
Mutually implementing the Nagoya Protocol and the Plant Treaty in Madagascar
A Darwin Initiative funded project coordinated by Bioversity International in Madagascar and Benin has communities devising personalized investment...
Increasing the profile of crop diversity in Uzbekistan
Bioversity International and partners joined forces to address the challenges to the existing system of seed and planting material production in...
Community seedbanks: securing diversity for climate change adaptation
Bioversity International’s policy scientist Ronnie Vernooy explains to Degrees of Latitude why community seedbanks are important for farming systems’...
Delhi Declaration on Agrobiodiversity Management adopted
The 1st International Agrobiodiversity Congress that was held in New Delhi, India, from 6 to 9 November 2016 concluded with the adoption of the Delhi...
Realizing farmers’ rights through community biodiversity management
Two new briefs examine how a community-based approach to crop diversity management, including supporting community seedbanks, can empower and benefit...
Enabled or disabled: is the environment right for using biodiversity to improve nutrition?
A new paper discusses the benefits of biodiversity for nutrition and explores what an enabling environment for biodiversity to improve nutrition might...
Cooperation and competition to conserve native diversity in Peru
As part of an incentive scheme in Peru to conserve quinoa biodiversity, farming communities received rewards, such as mattresses and spades, for...
CGIAR Partners
This work is carried out through the CGIAR Research Programs on Policies, Institutions, and Markets and Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security, and supported by CGIAR Trust Fund donors.