Category: News

On 19 November 2020, the Centro de Investigación Mariña of the Universidade de Vigo (CIM-UVigo), coordinator of the “European Blue Biobank” (EBB) project is organizing the workshop “Do not be a biopirate: the European Blue Biobank can help you use marine genetic resources legally” during the Bussiness2Sea on-line event, which be held from November 16 to 19.

The workshop will raise awareness of the existing obligations to access and use genetic resources derived from the Nagoya Protocol (2010) and associated regulations, presenting a number of use-cases based on the experience acquired by EBB project. Up to now, EBB has helped more than 30 users in obtaining legal clearance when utilizing genetic resources.

The meeting will allow to discuss the main lessons learnt through this process through a facilitated round table where several experts will engage with the audience.

The conference will take place on Zoom platform on the 19th November 2020 from 10:00 to 11:30 h. Attendance is free, but registration is required.

Euskal Errati Telebista (EiTB), the Basque Radio Television addressed the issue of Biodiversity, in its Teknopolis program, one of its senior programs. Our colleague Ibon Cancio, from the Plentzia Maritime Station (PIE) of the University of the Basque Country (UPV / EHU) was interviewed while he presented some of the coastal areas where he usually samples, places rich in biodiversity. Many of the species present in those areas can be utilized as marine genetic resources by the industry as well as by researchers from academia, in order to obtain products with many potential uses: cosmetic, nutrition, health… Ibon Cancio focused his intervention on the importance of properly explaining what marine genetic resources are, what is their origin, who owns them and how necessary is to protect those resources, hence preserving biodiversity.

Dr. Cancio explained the regulations governing access to genetic resources, focusing on the the Nagoya Protocol on Access and Benefit Sharing. He explained how the Nagoya protocol aims at a fair sharing of the benefits obtained from the exploitation of these genetic resources between both the party that exploits them and the provider country.

You can enjoy the full program here

The EBB project will celebrate its fourth general assembly on October 8, 27 and 28. The event will be held in a completely virtual way, due to the restrictions caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.

A total of 12 partners from the Atlantic Area will join this event, which will be also attended by members of the extended family of EMBRC.

A tour will be carried out through each of the project’s work packages, reporting on the progress made since the last general assembly in Bilbao (Spain), in November 2019, and focusing on the work that remains to be done before the project finishes.

A handbook on Access and Benefit Sharing (ABS) best practices will also be presented to the EBB community. This handbook will contribute to the improvement of the compliance with the ABS framework by EBB collections, and will serve as a reference handbook for the EMBRC community in the future.

In addition, the completion of several deliverables will lead to the presentation of a number of EBB products that will be capitalized in the near future, hence increasing the visibility and impact of EBB.

Don’t forget to check our website after the end of the assembly. There you will be find more news about what will be discussed.

You can find the agenda of the Assembly here.

Dr. Estefanía Paredes from University of Vigo submitted a video poster for the Virtual CRYO_2020. The Cryobiology community deals with biobanking and there is a strong international collaboration therefore this was very useful information for the community that needs to know the basics about ABS and where to find all the information needed to comply.

If you want, you can see her intervention in this video

A whole line of work (EBB work package 6, “Access and Benefit Sharing (ABS) compliance for innovative uses of Marine Biological Resources“) is devoted to engage with end-users and learn about the practical implications of complying with ABS regulation and the major hurdles they face.

In this engagement process, EBB has provided direct, practical help to 30 individuals and projects, gathering valuable information from these hands-on use-cases. First of all, EBB has drawn the end-users’ attention to the existence of an ABS legal framework and the need to comply with it. EBB has also helped users to determine whether their research was in scope of the ABS regulations, and when needed, it has pointed them to the appropriate National Authorities so that they could request their permits. In some cases, EBB has even submitted the application for access permits on behalf of the researchers from foreign countries visiting EBB partner institutions funded by ASSEMBLE Plus transnational access programme.

Likewise, large scale projects like Scuba Cancers, using cockles to investigate clonally transmissible cancers in the marine environment, COCKLES, focused on restoring cockles production or EnhanceMicroAlgae, which aims to increase the competitiveness of microalgal-based industries in the Atlantic Area have been benefited of EBB support. These are international projects that have accessed genetic resources of many countries of origin, which means that ABS Competent National Authorities from different consulted. In addition to that, EBB partners have also raised awareness about ABS regulations and helped other users from their home institutions. Private companies using marine genetic resources were also guided through ABS framework. This has provided valuable insights on how research projects implementation can be impacted by the existence of legal frameworks which differ between countries, and the fact that certain bodies, such as ethics committees, can act as extra checkpoints on occasions.

In spite of the considerable bureaucratic burden involved in ABS framework, it is important to underline the efficient and diligent response of national focal points dealing with ABS permits with whom EBB has interacted. Online systems for requesting the access permits and doing due diligence declarations also contribute to alleviate the administrative burden.

Overall, it has been a unique opportunity to make a difference and capitalize the experience and know-how acquired through the project to help end-users of marine genetic resources.

The EBB project has added two new members on the last two months. Carlos Ferreira has joined to the CIIMAR while Marimar Costa has started to be part of the ECIMAT team of CIM- University of Vigo. With these new additions EBB aims to increase its visibility in the media by improving its communication tasks and streamlining the administrative and technical tasks arising from coordination.

Carlos Ferreira

Carlos Ferreira graduated in Biochemistry in 2009, at the Faculty of Sciences of the University of Porto, and completed his master in Environmental Contamination and Toxicology in 2011, at Abel Salazar Biomedical Sciences Institute of the University of Porto. Later, he participated in different environmentally friendly biotechnological projects, completing his PhD in Environmental Engineering in  2019, at the Faculty of Engineering of the University of  Porto. Currently as part of the EBB project, Carlos is CIIMAR’s responsible for the establishment of  communication plans and outreach activities as well as for the definition of protocols for the preservation of CIIMAR’s LEGE culture collection. He is also responsible for the implementation of a quality system for collections users as well as elaboration of reports.

Marimar Costa

Ibon Cancio participated in the webinar “Webinar Aspectos Centrales de ABS y el Protocolo de Nagoya – Su papel en la Investigación, Desarrollo e Innovación Científica” inside the project Global ABS (Fortalecimiento de los recursos humanos, los marcos legales y las capacidades institucionales para aplicar el Protocolo de Nagoya) of the PNUD-GEF program of the United Nations for Latin America. The goals of the EBB Project were presented together with aspects related to the incorporation of Digital Sequence Information (DSI) to the definition of Genetic Resources, with the talk entitled: “20,000 genes de viaje marino: del recurso genético físico al digital, pasando por Nagoya”. The overarching goal of the webinar was to present the newly approved ABS national regulation to the scientific community of Uruguay.

The contents of the workshop can be visited here: https://abs-sustainabledevelopment.net/event/webinar-aspectos-centrales-de-abs-y-el-protocolo-de-nagoya-su-papel-en-la-investigacion-desarrollo-e-innovacion-cientifica/