National Biodiversity Authority UNEP GEF MoEF ABS Project Strengthening the implementation of the Biological Diversity Act and Rules with focus on its Access and Benefit Sharing Provisions CONCEPT NOTE AND AGENDA National Consultation on the Communicating for Access Benefit Sharing Date :19-20 November, 2013 Venue: Centre for Environment Education (CEE) Campus,Ahmedabad, Gujarat. Access Benefit Sharing A brief background: The Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) was opened for signature on 5 June 1992 at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (the Rio Earth Summit ) and entered into force on 29 December 1993. The Convention is the only international instrument comprehensively addressing biological diversity. The Convention s three objectives are the conservation of biological diversity, the sustainable use of its components and the fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from the utilisation of genetic resources.to further advance the implementation of the third objective, the World Summit on Sustainable Development (Johannesburg, September 2002) called for the negotiation of an international regime, within the framework of the Convention, to promote and safeguard the fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from the utilisation of genetic resources. The Convention s Conference of the Parties (CoP) responded at its seventh meeting, in 2004, by mandating its Ad Hoc Open-ended Working Group on Access and Benefit-sharing to elaborate and negotiate an international regime on access to genetic resources and benefit-sharing in order to effectively implement Articles 15 (Access to Genetic Resources) and 8(j) (Traditional Knowledge) of the aforesaid three objectives. After six years of negotiation, the Nagoya Protocol on Access to Genetic Resources and the Fair and Equitable Sharing of Benefits Arising from their Utilization to the Convention on Biological Diversity was adopted at the tenth meeting of the CoP on 29 October 2010, in Nagoya, Japan.
Communicating for ABS: Communication has the definite role in implementing the Access and Benefit Sharing (ABS) systems as per Biological Diversity Act at the national level for India. It provides us communication considerations, approaches and methods for the different phases of ABS implementation. Establishing ABS policies, regulations, institutions and mechanisms is a process of social change. Well-designed communication strategies will help us to manage the change effectively, and efficiently. Strategic communication requires specialist knowledge andexperience. ABS implementation process requires partnering with communication experts. Hence teaming up with individuals and partner agencies would help designing and implementing the communication strategy. Why a Special Communication Required for ABS A lot has been written about communication, about strategiccommunication, and about communicating biodiversity. Why do we need a special targetedcommunication systemfor ABS implementation? The short answer is: Because ABS is new, and because it is complex. What s New about ABS? Although the basic concept is as old as the Convention on Biological Diversity, many people still don t know much about ABS. In October 2010 a new internationally agreed framework the Nagoya Protocol to implement the ABS principles of the Convention was adopted at the tenth Conference of the Parties (COP 10). Since then, the focus has turned from international negotiations to national implementation and thisis indeed a very new task for many people within India and in many countries. The community of ABS practitioners is still in a learning process, regarding both implementation and communication. At this stage, the Protocol is still not very well known let alone understood so that communicating ABS to the various stakeholdersoften starts from scratch. What s Complex about ABS? ABS works at different levels and with a great diversity of stakeholders: ABS involves many expert issues (e.g., biology, technology, law, justice, economics, politics, ethics, culture, etc.), and it is hard for any individual to be a fully-fledged ABS expert. ABS touches upon a variety of sectors and markets such as agriculture, horticulture, pharmaceuticals, veterinary, cosmetics, biotechnology and others. The range of stakeholders in ABS is very broad and heterogeneous: From policy makers and legal experts, via scientists, business people and NGOs, to indigenous and local communities. They all have their own worldviews and perspectives, speak their own languages, have their own interests and objectives and the distribution of power among them is often unequal. There is a good deal of interdependence between the Nagoya Protocol on ABS and other international agreements, for example in the context of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO), the Food and Agriculture
Organisation (FAO), the World Health Organisation (WHO) or the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES). ABS is not a project with clear boundaries in space or time. Rather, ABS is a political arena and a policy field: Communicating ABS is only partly about selling a new concept but much more about leading, coordinating and facilitating a socio-political negotiation process. The Nagoya Protocol has the potential to reduce the complexity of ABS, but only if all stakeholders can arrive at a shared understanding of how to implement it which requires good communication. India s Strides on Access Benefit Sharing: The CBD was adopted in the year 1992 and the Biological Diversity (BD) Act in India was enacted in 2002, taking the cognizance of the provisions of CBD and to deal with extensive pressure on our biological resources. To detail the procedures to be adopted, the Biological Diversity Rules were notified in the year 2004. Several state rules were also notified subsequently for implementing the Act in various states of India. Implementation of ABS provisions under the Biological Diversity Act provides significant challenge and opportunity for the National Biodiversity Authority (NBA), State Biodiversity Boards (SBBs) and the Biodiversity Management Committees (BMCs) in realising the objectives of the CBD & BD Act. Inspite of more than a decade of existence of the Act and Rules, stakeholders are still unclear about ABS provisions under the Act. This Consultation is an effort to demystify issues relevant to ABS under the Indian Biological Diversity Act through evolving effective communication tools, methodologies, strategies and innovative approaches. This consultation is also to bring together the experts in communication and domain knowledge holders on ABS to evolve a better outputs. Objectives: Evolve an innovative and effective communication strategy for the ABS under BD Act in India. Developing effective communication tools for specific stakeholders. Use of modern communication methodologies and approaches for communicating the Essence of ABS under the act to various relevant stakeholders. The Consultation will have 5 working groups (10-15 people each) alongside two plenaries with opening and closing remarks on the thematic areas with working group presentations with generated outputs on the following thematic groups: 1. Communicating ABS for BMCs Every local body (for eg.,villagepanchayat), in accordance with provisions of Section 41 of the BD Act shall constitute a BMC within its area for the purpose of promoting conservation, sustainable use and documentation of biological diversity including preservation of habitats, conservation of land races, folk varieties and cultivars, domesticated stocks and breeds of animals and micro-organisms and chronicling of knowledge relating to biological diversity. The BMCs are the statutory bodies at the local level.
2. Using Print, Electronic Media and Social Networking Tools to Raise Awareness on ABS Use of advanced technologies such as tweeters, Google Groups, Wiki-space, Face Book, Caricature, social media, multimedia has become current trend of communication and large number of stakeholders do have attraction for these media along with innovatively designed print materials hence this calls for us to use these tools for the communicating ABS. 3. Development of Curriculum for ABS. Since last two years NBA has put in its efforts to popularise the provisions of act with special reference to ABS, over the months there is fair amount of demand to learn and understand more information about access benefit sharing as per the biological diversity act. Hence this calls for developing an curriculum for the specific target groups these groups are decision makers, legal professionals, BMCs, managers of natural resources, line departments dealing with biological resources, pharma and biotechnology industries, national and international corporates,users and benefit claimers under the biological diversity act. Hence we need to evolve an curriculum for these target groups to educate them about the provisions of ABS under the act. 4. Communicating ABS to Legal Professionals. Fair amount of interest has been generated among the Legal Professionals within India to access the knowledge about the biological diversity act and its ABS provisions, as print media has communicated many issues relevant to the act across the nation. It also becomes inevitable for the practicing lawyers and legal advisors at the bio-resources user of agencies & corporates to understand realities involved in each of the cases in depth about biological resources and relevant practices among the users of bio-resources. Hence we need to develop relevant communication tools for the Legal Professionals dealing the BD act and its ABS provisions. 5. Communicating ABS Mechanism to State Biodiversity Boards. The National Biodiversity Authority (NBA) wishes to bring all the State Biodiversity Boards (SBBs) into one plain of understanding to deal with ABS provisions under the biological diversity act. Currently thesbbs deal with bio-resources access applications for the Indian bio-resource users and thereby deal with benefit arising out of bio-resources by the users and benefit claimers. Since India is large country with diversity of culture and resources. This calls for suitable communication tools to reach common goals under the Biological Diversity Act
National Biodiversity Authority UNEP GEF MoEF ABS Project Project Title: Strengthening the implementation of the Biological Diversity Act and Rules with focus on its Access and Benefit Sharing Provisions National Consultation on the Communicating for Access Benefit Sharing Date :19-20 November, 2013 Venue: Centre for Environment Education (CEE) Campus, Ahmedabad, Gujarat. Draft Agenda Date : 19 Nov,2013 09:30-10:30 Registration & Grouping 10:30-11:00 Inauguration Key Note Address on Communicating for ABS 11:00-11:20 Photo Sessions &Coffee / Tea Break 11:20-12:00 Opening Plenary - Introducing Working Groups topics to participants and team leads 1. WG1 - Communicating ABS for BMCs 2. WG2 - Using Print and Electronic Media and Social NetworkingTools to Raise Awareness on ABS 3. WG3 - Development of Curriculum for ABS 4. WG4 - Communicating ABS to Legal Professionals 5. WG5 -Communicating ABS Mechanism to State Biodiversity Boards 12:00-13:30 Working Groups Sessionsat Seminar Halls WG1 - Seminar Hall No--- WG2- Seminar Hall No--- WG3- Seminar Hall No--- WG4- Seminar Hall No--- WG5 - Seminar Hall No--. 13:30-14:00 Lunch Break 14:00-15:30 Working Group Presentations 15:30-15:45 Coffee / Tea Break 15:45-17:30 Discussion & Closing Remarks for the Day Deliberations
Date : 20 Nov, 2013 Work Group Presentations 10:00-10:20 WG1 - Topic: Communicating ABS for BMCs 10:20-10:40 WG2 - Topic: Using Print, Electronic Media and Social Networking Tools to Raise Awareness on ABS 10:40-11:00 Coffee / Tea Break 11:00-11:20 WG3 - Topic: Development of Curriculum for ABS 11:20-11:40 WG4 - Topic: Communicating ABS to Legal Professionals. 11:40-12:00 WG5 Topic: Communicating ABS Mechanism to State Biodiversity Boards 12:00-13:30 Discussion and Fine Tuning the Documents. 13:30-14:00 Lunch Break 14:00-15:00 Presentation of the Documents Before the Group by Team Leads Submission of Hard and Soft Copies of Outputs to NBA 15:00-15:15 Coffee / Tea Break 15:15-15:40 Closing Plenary 15:40-16:00 Open Interaction Among the Working Groups 16:00-17:00 Closing remarks/ TA Disbursements by the NBA Accounts Division