Biotech Updates

Nagoya Protocol Meeting Prepares Towards Implementation

July 13, 2012

The second meeting of the Intergovernmental Committee for the Nagoya Protocol (ICNP) was held on July 2-6, 2012 in New Delhi, India. It was attended by around 500 delegates who agreed on the recommendations on the key issues for the implementation of the Nagoya Protocol on Access to Genetic Resources and Fair and Equitable Sharing of Benefits Arising from Their Utilization. The Nagoya Protocol was discussed in 2010 during the 10th meeting of Conference of the Parties (COP) to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). The Protocol will enter into force 90 days after 50 Parties have completed ratification. At present, five out of the 93 countries who have signed the Protocol have already finished the ratification. It is expected that by the end of this year, more countries will complete the ratification process.

During the meeting, the Committee advanced recommendations on compliance, capacity-building, awareness-raising, a clearing-house, guidance to the financial mechanism, resource mobilization and a global mechanism for benefit-sharing. All of these in preparation for the first meeting of the governing body of the Protocol, which is expected to take place in 2014. The Committee also presented recommendations on the Nagoya Protocol for the upcoming 11th meeting of the COP in Hyderabad, India on October 8-19, 2012.

Read CBD's media release at http://www.cbd.int/doc/press/2012/pr-2012-07-06-icnp2-en.pdf. The in-session documents and recommendations are available for download at http://www.cbd.int/icnp2/in-session/.