Friends, a very important initiative PRRI, Public Research and Regulation Initiative has been launched last year. The main purpose is to enhance scientific information about biosafety within the framework of international negotiations such as the Cartagena Biosafety Protocol. You are all invited to become members of the forum of PRRI, Public Research and Regulation Initiative.
The Vision:
Countries and organisations throughout the world have invested considerably in public sector research, and are continuing to do so, in order to develop biotechnological applications that meet a variety of crucial needs such as strengthening the sustainable production of food, feed and fibre, addressing water shortage, improving health care and environmental protection.
The extent to which modern biotechnology will be able to achieve these goals will depend to a large extent on the regulations that apply to biotechnology and on the way in which they are implemented. These national regulations in turn are strongly influenced by international agreements, such as the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety (CPB). This Protocol was negotiated between 1995 and 2000, adopted in January 2000, and came into force in September 2003. The first Meeting of the Parties (MOP1) took place in February 2004 in Kuala Lumpur, the second MOP was in Montreal last May-June and in MOP3 (Curitiba, Brazil) we successfully participated with a very strong delegation in March 2006. The latest report can be downloaded from the main webpage http://www.pubresreg.org.
A central aim of the negotiations was to involve all stakeholders. Records of the negotiations show that NGOs and the private sector were indeed well represented. However, the public research sector involved in modern biotechnology, which includes over a hundred thousand researchers in thousands governmental, academic and international research institutions in developing and developed countries, was not represented in any significant or organised way during the negotiations or during MOP1.
As a result, the public research sector has not been able to provide scientific input for the benefit of the negotiations or to express its views about the effectiveness and workability of the provisions of the Protocol. Another consequence of the absence of the public research sector during the negotiations is the persistence of the misconception that modern biotechnology, and in particular its agricultural application, is the exclusive domain of a handful of big, western multinationals.
The Public Research and Regulation Initiative (PRRI) described below aims to offer a forum for the public research sector to be informed about and involved regulations and international agreements relevant to modern biotechnology, such as the Meetings of the Parties to CPB.
Much more information can be taken from http://www.pubresreg.org
Two texts may be mentioned here:
1. PRRI draft guide for Notifications and Risk Assessments for Releases of GMOs, see main page
2. Table on research activities in the developing world, see http://pubresreg.org/Members/Kim/working groups/Aarhus/
Klaus Ammann
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