Press releases

MINSK, 5 February (BelTA) – Minsk will play host to an introductory seminar under the international technical assistance project “Strengthening human resources, legal frameworks and institutional capacities to implement the Nagoya Protocol” on 7 February, BelTA learned from the press service of the National Academy of Sciences of Belarus.

This project is part of the global project for 24 countries and funded by the Global Environment Facility (GEF).

The seminar will be attended by representatives of the UNDP Office in Belarus, the Institute of Genetics and Cytology at the NASB (the executor of the project), the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environmental Protection, the scientific organizations sharing resources with other countries, representatives of Kazakhstan and Tajikistan who are implementing this project. The opening remarks will be delivered by Claudio Chiarolla, Regional Project Specialist for Eastern Europe and other Countries of the UNDP-GEF Global Project on ABS, and Alexander Korbut, the Deputy Minister of Natural Resources and Environmental Protection of Belarus.

“The aim of the Nagoya Protocol is to ensure fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising out of the utilization of genetic resources which includes any material of plant, animal, microbial or other origin containing functional units of heredity and of actual or potential value, and hence the entire biological diversity of Belarus. These are plants, animals, strains of microorganisms, and collections of varieties and seeds, agricultural crops. In fact, the compliance by a country with the provisions of the Nagoya Protocol means the guaranteed receipt of benefits arising from the utilization of genetic resources of own country and willingness to accordingly provide benefits to countries-suppliers of genetic resources,” the NASB said.

The Nagoya Protocol to the Convention on Biological Diversity was adopted on 29 October 2010 and entered into force on 12 October 2014. It is a complementary protocol to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity.