ISAAA News - October 20, 2021

Figure: Dr. Mahaletchumy Arujanan, ISAAA Global Coordinator.

The part one of the UN Biodiversity Conference organized by the Convention on Biological Diversity has addressed critical areas of work and highlighted the capacity of countries to cope up with the changes and move forward towards global sustainability.

The High-level Segment of the conference was held in Kunming, China on October 12-13, 2021 where the Kunming Declaration was adopted. The Declaration indicated that there is a great need for "urgent and integrated actions for transformative change across all sectors of the economy and all parts of the society…to shape future path for nature and people, where biodiversity is conserved and used sustainably, and the benefits arising from the utilization of genetic resources are shared fairly and equitably, as an integral part of sustainable development." The countries committed to negotiate an effective post-2020 global biodiversity framework which will be finalized next year. Over 5,000 individuals joined the discussions onsite and online.

ISAAA actively participated in the discussions and submitted a statement on the emergence of new technologies for agriculture: "Article 19 of CBD spells out clearly the need to facilitate distribution of benefits of modern biotechnology. However, in the past 18 years since the Biosafety Protocol came into force, it is struggling to achieve these objectives. Products of modern biotechnology have been subjected to over-regulation...With limited funding and the emergence of newer technologies, where are we leading the Protocol to? Will the newer technologies like new breeding techniques, gene drive and synthetic biology face the same fate as genetic modification?"

Read the complete ISAAA statement for more details. Download the press release from CBD for more information on the UN Biodiversity Conference.