www.checkbiotech.org ; www.raupp.info ; www.czu.cz

Switzerland says some progress has been made at an international conference
in Brazil on biodiversity, even if few measures were agreed, March 2006.

The ten-day meeting sought to win a commitment from governments party to
the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) to significantly
reduce biodiversity loss by 2010.

The meeting in the Brazilian city of Curitiba discussed such comprehensive
issues as promoting sustainable use of biodiversity, protecting traditional
knowledge, ensuring the equitable sharing of benefits from the use of
"genetic resources" and finding funding for developing countries to
implement the convention.

The director of the Swiss Environment Office, Bruno Oberle, said governments
were able to agree on the details concerning the Cartagena Protocol on
Biosafety.

"It was decided that genetically-modified foodstuffs and animal feed have to
be labelled as such when they are transported from one state to another,"
Oberle told swissinfo.

Oberle admitted that little progress was achieved on one of the key issues;
access to genetic resources and benefit sharing (ABS).

The convention says that countries have to be informed and compensated by
third parties such as multinational concerns who remove, for example, rare
plants in order to use their genetic resources.

How?

"This is a principle recognised by all of the signatory states," Oberle
said. "Now, we are at the point where we have to agree on how and what
mechanism should be used to implement the ABS.

"But of course, there is a lot of different opinion on how to do this,
especially concerning a timeframe for its implementation. Switzerland's
position is that the ABS in its present form includes unclear formulations,"
he explained.

"For example, a 'genetic resource' is not clearly defined. Is it the genome,
the plant or something else?"

Oberle said he did not expect a decision soon on this issue since it was
important to reach agreement on a mechanism that would work in practice.

Swtizerland's representative welcomed the announcement by the Brazilian
president, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, that Brazil would place 500,000
hectares of Amazonian rain forest under special protection.

Oberle also mentioned the "Global Island Partnership" agreed by island
states to enhance marine and terrestrial protected areas as another of the
achievements reached at the conference.
[www.nzz.ch]

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