Communiqué: United Nations meeting on the Safe Use of Living Modified Organisms opens Monday 1st October

Hyderabad, 27 September 2012 – Some 2000 delegates from more than 150 countries will convene this coming Monday in Hyderabad, India, for the sixth meeting of the Conference of the Parties serving as the meeting of the Parties to the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety (COP MOP 6). The meeting will discuss and adopt further decisions to contribute to ensuring the safe transfer, handling and use of living modified organisms (LMOs) resulting from modern biotechnology. These will include decisions to advance the implementation of the 10-year Strategic Plan for the Protocol adopted in 2010 and the entry into force of the Nagoya – Kuala Lumpur Supplementary Protocol on Liability and Redress to the Protocol.

This comes at a time when Jamaica deposited its instrument of ratification to the Protocol on 25 September 2012. It will become the 164th Party to the Protocol on 24 December 2012.

The Cartagena Protocol Biosafety was adopted on 29 January 2000 and entered into force on 11 September 2003. The Nagoya – Kuala Lumpur Supplementary Protocol on Liability and Redress was adopted at the last meeting of the Parties in Nagoya, Japan in 2010. It received 51 signatures and two ratifications by 6 March 2012 when it was closed for signature. The Supplementary Protocol will enter into force 90 days after 40 Parties have ratified it.
At the five-day meeting, delegates are expected to discuss issues relating to: capacity-building, the Biosafety Clearing-House, the financial mechanism and resources for the Protocol’s implementation, risk assessment and risk management, socio-economic considerations concerning LMOs, compliance with the Protocol’s provisions as well as assessment and review of the effectiveness of the Protocol. The decisions taken on all these issues are expected to contribute to the realization of the vision of the Strategic Plan: Making biological diversity adequately protected from any adverse effects of LMOs.

In her welcome message, Smt. Jayanthi Natarajanthe, Minister of Environment and Forest of the Government of India, the host of the meeting, urged delegates to join hands and engage in a meaningful dialogue aimed at achieving path-breaking resolutions for preserving our common future.
The Executive Secretary of the Convention on Biological Diversity, Mr. Braulio Ferreira de Souza Dias, said: “COP MOP 6 provides yet another opportunity to further strengthen international cooperation and build global political support for the Protocol and its Supplementary Protocol. It also presents an opportunity to lay new strategies and mobilize resources for the implementation of the two treaties.”