Bio-safety conference ends in Hyderabad

The sixth meeting of Conference of Parties to the Cartagena Protocol on Bio-safety today accepted key draft papers submitted by two working groups on issues such as handling, transport, packaging and identification of living (genetically) modified organisms and liability and redress and socio-economic considerations.

Special Secretary in the Ministry of Environment and Forests M F Farooqui, who chaired the conference, said on the last day of the conference that the convention has adopted 18 key decisions. He also said the convention decided to appoint an ad-hoc group on the Socio-Economic considerations. 

It has also been decided that there would be an ad-hoc technical group which will go into the issues of socio-economic considerations. The group will submit its paper in the next COP MOP 7, Farrooqui told reporters. He said discussions took place on the Nagoya-Kuala Lumpur Supplementary Protocol. The Protocol, which was adopted at Nagoya, Japan in 2010, has received 51 signatures and two ratifications by March 6, 2012. 

It will come into force 90 days after 40 Parties have ratified it, he said. The Supplementary Protocol deals with liability and redress for damage resulting from trans-boundary of movements of LMOs. 

The COP MOP 6 will be followed by Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (COP 11) here from October 8 to 19 and is expected to see participation of heads of several countries, including Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. Ferreira de Souza Dias, the executive secretary of the Convention on Biodiversity, said the secretariat is concerned about the availability of funds. The core budget itself is USD 5.01 million. 

Apart from voluntary contribution and trust fund, all member countries will be contributing to this core budget depending on their gross national product, as per the UN scale. Richer countries will contribute more and vice-versa, he added. 

PTI