At the Conference of Parties-11 (COP-11) on Wednesday, the Working Group-1 reached a consensus on article 8-j of the convention on biological diversity. Under the consensus the parties will undertake to respect, preserve and maintain the practices of indigenous and local communities relevant for the conservation of biological diversity and encourage equitable sharing of benefits arising out of the use of biological diversity.
However, the group failed to reach a consensus on the proposal to declare July 13 as the ‘international day for local communities’ as the European Union and Norway raised objections. A contact group will likely be formed to sort out the differences between the countries in this regard.
The consensus on Nagoya Protocol and setting of targets was discussed by the second Working Group at COP-11. The various countries agreed to a third high level panel on Intergovernmental Committee for Nagoya Protocol (ICNP) on the lines of the one conducted earlier this year at New Delhi. Various indigenous communities and stakeholders will discuss the access to benefit sharing (ABS) for implementation of the protocol with international representatives.
On the issue of mobilisation of financial resources which has been the focus of the discussions so far, a contact group co-chaired by Belgium ad South Africa has been formed to discuss the issues in detail over the coming days.
Further, a Friends of Chair group was formed by the Global Environment Facility which met on Wednesday evening to answer queries on finance mechanisms for funding the adoption of the protocol.