The Biosafety Clearing-House and the Rest of the Protocol

In one line

The rest of the Protocol is a website, a capacity-building programme, a set of duties towards the public, and the ordinary machinery of a treaty.

In exam wording: article 19 of the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety 2000 requires each Party to designate a national focal point and one or more competent national authorities and to notify the Secretariat; article 20 establishes the Biosafety Clearing-House as part of the clearing-house mechanism of article 18(3) of the Convention, to facilitate the exchange of scientific, technical, environmental and legal information and to assist Parties in implementation; article 21 protects confidential information while providing that information on the name and address of the notifier, a general description of the organism, a summary of the risk assessment and any methods and plans for emergency response may not be treated as confidential; articles 22 and 23 deal with capacity building and with public awareness and participation; article 24 with non-Parties; article 25 with illegal transboundary movements; article 26 with socio-economic considerations; article 27 with liability and redress; and articles 28 to 40 with the financial mechanism, the meeting of the Parties, subsidiary bodies, the Secretariat, compliance, monitoring and reporting, assessment and review, and the final clauses.

Article 20: the Biosafety Clearing-House

Established as part of the clearing-house mechanism under article 18(3) of the Convention on Biological Diversity, for two purposes: to facilitate the exchange of scientific, technical, environmental and legal information on, and experience with, living modified organisms; and to assist Parties to implement the Protocol, taking into account the special needs of developing countries and countries with economies in transition.

What Parties must make available through it. Existing laws, regulations and guidelines for implementation and information required for the article 11 procedure; bilateral, regional and multilateral agreements; summaries of risk assessments or environmental reviews generated by regulatory processes and carried out in accordance with article 15, including where appropriate relevant information on products of living modified organisms; final decisions on import or release; and reports submitted under article 33, including on implementation of the advance informed agreement procedure.

Why it matters. Every deadline in the Protocol is tied to it. The article 11 notice is posted on it within fifteen days; the article 10 decision is communicated to it; the article 12 review is communicated to it within thirty days; and the internationally recognized certificate under the Nagoya Protocol is published on the equivalent Access and Benefit-sharing Clearing-House.

Article 21: confidential information

21(1). The Party of import shall permit the notifier to identify information submitted under the Protocol, or required by the Party as part of the advance informed agreement procedure, that is to be treated as confidential, and justification shall be given on request.