Opening Remarks by Ms. Elaine Conkievich

UNDP Resident Representative,

11 December, 2019

Honorable quests, Vise Minister Batbayar, Ladies and gentlemen,

Congratulate with the achievements of the Global ABS project-” Strengthening human resources, legal and institutional capacities to implement the Nagoya Protocol” within three years period with small amount of funding from the GEF. One of the biggest achievements is the finalization of the Genetic resources Law, supporting documents for the submission of the law and the regulations.

The Nagoya Protocol on Access to Genetic Resources and the Fair and Equitable Sharing of Benefits Arising from their Utilization (herein after referred to as “the Nagoya Protocol” or “the Protocol”) was adopted by the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity at its tenth meeting in Nagoya, Japan, 2010.  120 countries are the Parties of the Protocol.  

The Nagoya Protocol consists of three elements:

First, the contracting parties may regulate access to biological materials (“genetic resources”) originating from their territories. States that choose to do so, are called “provider countries”.

Second, these provider countries may also require that “benefits” from using the biological materials are fairly shared with them. Together, these requirements are known as access and benefit-sharing (“ABS”) rules.

Third, all contracting parties must monitor the use of biological material on their territory to ensure that companies comply with the ABS rules where the material originated.

In order to assist countries to implement the Nagoya Protocol Global Environment Facility was requested to provide financial resources to improve capacities of the Parties to build or develop capacity to effectively implement the Protocol based on the needs and priorities of Parties and indigenous and local communities.

The Global environmental benefit from this Global project will unleash a wide range of monetary and non-monetary benefits for providers of genetic resources.

Mongolia ratified the Nagoya Protocol, the supplementary protocol of the CBD, on October 12, 2014.  According to the Protocol parties should have developed their national legislations and disclose to other parties that are interested in genetic resources of the provider country to operationalize fair access to genetic resources, associated traditional knowledge and equitable sharing of the benefits from their utilization. 

Mongolia is a provider country with rich biological materials.   Country with exceedingly variable climatic conditions, which give rise to many unique ecosystems and biota, extreme environments, and a high endemism of genetic resources.  Although the number of Mongolian biological species and endemic animals and plants is lower than the numbers of species in many other countries, the assemblage of species and intact ecosystems cannot be found anywhere else.  

Although Mongolia has entered into several joint ventures with respect to the conservation and utilization of genetic resources, there is no specific policy and administrative measures addressing access to genetic resources.  Environmental Protection Law, Law on Flora and Fauna have been used to regulate the access and sustainable use of biological   resources of the country.

According to the draft national legislation, research institutes and private sector companies are requested to enter into agreement with providers of the Genetic resources, associated Traditional Knowledge-(GRATK) for sharing the benefits raised from their utilization, after taking Prior Informed Consent from the providers.   Although it creates additional steps for genetic resource users and researchers, it will contribute to the country’s knowledge economy development thorough sharing the benefits raised from the utilization of traditional knowledge. For it, registration of the ancient valuable traditional knowledge associated genetic resources is crucial as a defensive protection tool for the intellectual property of the Mongolian nation.  Appreciate, that the project designed the National Clearing House Mechanism, which includes registration of the Traditional Knowledges associated with the utilization of genetic resources.

You will hear detailed information on the achievements of the project during this event and invited to make comments and suggestions for the delivered products, proposed sectoral guideline, which includes ethical code of conduct, traditional knowledge guideline and scheme for the introduction of ABS mechanisms into the current procedures of the key sectors.

Now that the project is ending this year, we are willing to cooperate with the Government on further dissemination of the Access and Benefit sharing principles and creation of the full TK registration system, which will enable the full implementation of the Nagoya Protocol in the country.  

Wish you all the best.