September, 2003
CIEL is organizing a session on “Implementing prior informed consent in access agreements in light of the Bonn Guidelines” at the upcoming Global Biodiversity Forum (GBF) in Cancun, Mexico, in September, 1993.
The GBF was founded in 1993 by The World Conservation Union (IUCN), the World Resource Institute (WRI), the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), and the African Centre for Technology Studies (ACTS) to provide a mechanism to foster analysis and critical dialogue among a wide range of stakeholders on key ecological, economic, social and institutional issues related to biodiversity. The 18th Session of the Global Biodiversity Forum (GBF18-Cancun/WTO5) will be convened from 5-7 September 2003, immediately prior to the 5th WTO Ministerial Conference, to provide a platform for the trade and biodiversity communities to consider how the pursuit of their respective goals and objectives might complement or hinder each other. Specifically, GBF18-Cancun aims to:
- Build greater understanding of the positive and negative impacts of the international trade agenda on biodiversity from a range of perspectives.
- Explore key issues that could lead to mutual supportiveness between international processes related to trade, biodiversity and sustainable development.
- Provide informed recommendations on biodiversity-related policies to key actors in the Doha Round.
- Build new networks and strengthen existing ones among the trade and biodiversity communities.
In this context, the session organized by CIEL will focus on the relationship between Genetic Resourses and Intellectual Property. Specifically, CIEL attorney Anne Perrault will analyze how the recognition of the rights of local communities to prior informed consent for use of genetic resources and traditional knowledge is strongly justified by international norms and economic considerations. Moreover, she will discuss the legal and economic reasons that support, in turn, national government recognition of the rights of local communities to prior informed consent for use of traditional knowledge and biological resources. Finally, she will identify different approaches to prior informed consent used in various contexts (including access and benefit sharing, mining, gas, dams, etc.).
Alongside Anne on the panel, Brendan Tobin, from Association for the Defense of Natural Rights Peru, will refer to the need to redefine the public domain to ensure that the prior informed consent of indigenous peoples is required for use of traditional knowledge, and Ridwana Yusuf-Jooma, from IUCN South Africa, will share a South African case-study on biodiversity conservation and its relationship with intellectual property rights.
For more information on the upcoming GBF, go to: http://www.gbf.ch/