Biological Diversity Convention

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The Convention on Biological Diversity (hereafter: “CBD”) is an international treaty adopted by United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, held at Rio de Janeiro in June 1992 and came into force on December 29, 1993. Initially when it came into force there were 168 members now it is 193 in total. The aim to protect biodiversity and the dramatic steps taken for conservation, sustainable use and the fair and equitable sharing of benefits attracted the world communities to become members (History of the Convention, n.d). In principle the convention on biological diversity changed the ownership concept of biodiversity protection i.e. (“common heritage of humankind”) to the “sovereign right” of each member country (Hirsch, 2012). It is the responsibility of the each member to develop and implement policies in a way that helps in the conservation and sustainable use of biological resources. It also recognizes the knowledge of local and indigenous people for conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity (Brahmi et al., 2004).The article 8(j) of CBD has an important provision which gives the member state rights to “respect, preserve and maintain” traditional style and knowledge about the conservation and sustainable use of biological diversity. The protection must promote the wider application of such knowledge and stimulate innovation and also ensure that the benefits are shared in fair and equitable manner to the communities.
The three objectives of the conventions are “conservation of biological diversity, sustainable use of its components, the fair and equitable sharing of the benefits arising out of the utilization of genetic resources” .
• The focus of the first objective “Conservation of biological diversity” is...

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...n health (About the Protocol, n.d).

2.1.1 Exception in CBD:

As CBD gives the member state the rights to regulate the “access to genetic resources within their jurisdictional scope”, developing countries where concerned whether this would include plant genetic resource of food and agriculture before CBD entry (15-21). This was made clear with an international instrument dealing with The Plant Genetic Resource for Food and Agriculture (IPGRFA) which came into force in 2004. The objectives are similar to that of CBD - “the conservation and sustainable use of genetic resource of food and agricultural resources and the fair and equitable sharing of the benefits on use”. The system of sharing benefits is by multilateral agreements and this treaty also has provision on farmer’s rights. It is left to the national law to decide (Biodiversity-related Conventions, n.d).

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