On the 12th of November 2020, our colleague and EBB partner Heidi Tillin, from the Marine Biological Association (MBA), gave a virtual talk on the “Coffee Time Talk” seminar series organized by MBA about the Nagoya Protocol entitled: “Research & Biopiracy: An Intro to Nagoya Protocol & European Access & Benefit Sharing Regulations”.
She briefly introduced the legislative background of the Convention on Biological Diversity and the Nagoya Protocol. Then, she explained what is Access and Benefit Sharing and the obligations imposed on the users of genetic resources or traditional knowledge in the European Union by the EU REG511/2014. She also showed to the audience the ABS Clearing House and how it can help final users to comply with the regulations associated with the Nagoya Protocol.
After this introduction, she focused on marine collections, and what are the requirements that the collections needs to demonstrate to become an EU registered collection. According to this, she explained that many organizations have developed guidelines for improving their practices. She exposed the advances made in the frame of EBB project and that a Handbook on implementation of Best Practices focused on biobanks and collections has been developed. This new document, created under the umbrella of EMBRC and its ABS working group, is divided in two parts: the first one introduces the legal framework and the second one includes technical guidelines and some useful annexes for their implementation.
The recording of the presentation is available here.
