All set for Bonn genetics meeting |14 April 2008

They said they will share contents of the plan with their counterparts who were not at meeting so that they collectively push for the proposed new regulations together at the Conference of Parties on the Convention on Biodiversity (CBD) due next month in Bonn.

“We have today established our position for negotiations at the meeting,” Seychelles Minister for Environment, Natural Resources and Transport Joel Morgan told Nation in an interview after he officially closed the meeting at the International Conference Centre on Saturday.

“We will now circulate this document to other ministers of Environment in Africa through the African Union and attempt to organise a meeting prior to the main conference to negotiate and establish our final position in view of commonalities and differences,” he said.

He said that there are many points that the ministers came up with, but the most important was the need for a “legally binding international regime for access to biological and genetic materials and sharing of the benefits that derive from them.

Earlier, Minister Morgan had said that Seychelles’ own laws on such materials have already been drafted and are awaiting ratification and that the ministers were aware other regions are also preparing to put forward similar calls for international regulations during the Bonn meeting.

The executive secretary of the BD, Dr Ahmed Djoghlaf, commended the ministers for their efforts in preparing what was referred to as a blueprint.

He noted that they had worked in unity which he believed would be the case when Africa presents it case at the Convention meeting.

Among the issues discussed at the meeting were the effects of climate change and the shift to biofuels, on biodiversity.

Representatives of the different countries were given copies of a CD entitled: “They must not die,” which contained songs urging the preservation of biodiversity.

It’s composer, Joe Samy, sang the title song during the opening of the conference on Thursday.