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The Convention of Biological Diversity's (CBD)
working group on biosafety has had a rough ride since Rio.
Delegates heading to Cartagena de Indias in Colombia in February
for the Sixth - and supposedly last - meeting of the group knew
that they still had a long way to go to finalise an international
Biosafety Protocol. What few expected was that, after ten
days and mostly sleepless nights of strenuous give-and-take, they
would still not be able to approve the Protocol. At the First
Extraordinary Meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the CBD
(ExCop, February 22-23) the United States and a few other countries,
backed by the biotechnology industrial lobby, refused to prioritise
environmental and social concerns over the free and unrestrained
worldwide trade of Living Modified Organisms (LMOs).
The so-called Miami Group (led by the US, and supported
by Canada, Australia, Argentina, Chile and Brazil) insisted in deleting
language that would protect crop diversity, food safety and human
health, while refusing to abide by the precautionary principle and
forcing LMO producers and exporters to assume liability over the
environmental, health or socioeconomic consequences of transgenic
trade. The group's position closely mirrored that of a global
coalition of 2,200 transnationalorporations who were lobbying hard
in Cartagena.
Facing up to the small Miami Group was the Like-Minded
Group, a coalition of 130 African, Asian, some East European and
most Latin American coutries. This group, later joined by
the European Union, compromised its position considerably and was
willing to endorse a much watered-down final draft, which was still
unacceptable to those backing biotech interests. What the
group was not willing to give up was: the inclusion in the Protocol
of commodities, not just seeds (which would exclude 90% of LMO trade);
the predominance - or at least parity - of the CBD over trade agreements;
liability and inclusion of socioeconomic considerations; and the
precautionary principle as a fundamental tenet of the Protocol.
As Tewolde Egziabher of the Ethiopian delegation said at the closing,
"All agreed, all compromised, but for one small group of
countries."
ExCop decided that negotiations will continue under
the guidance of Colombian Environment Minster Juan Mayr, and will
be concluded sometime before the Fifth Conference of the Parties,
scheduled for May 2000. If the CBD cannot heed the growing
demand from people all over for controls over genetic engineering
and its products, many countries and regional groups will soon be
passing laws to stall the entry of unwanted LMOs, and at the same
time monitoring events at the WTO so that biosafety concerns are
not interpreted as 'restrictions to free trade.'
Sources: Several NGO delegates in Cartagena, press
and the Earth Negotiations Bulletin, http://www.iisd.ca/linkages
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