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Biosafety Clearing-House News
The Egyptian Environmental affairs Agency in collaboration with UNEP-GEF will organize the first national workshop on BCH entitled "Introduction to the CPB & BCH: Obligations & Operations" coordinated by Dr. Ossama Abdel-Kawy, Egypt BCH project coordinator. The workshop will be held on 25 August 2008, at Sofitel, El Maadi, Cairo with participation from Prof. Moustafa Fouda, Head of Nature Conservation Sector & Egypt CBD National Focal Point and prof. Ossama El-Tayeb, Egypt CPB National Focal Point. The workshop will focus on the CPB and the BCH as an information exchange mechanism established by the CPB to assist Parties to implement its provisions and to facilitate sharing of information on, and experience with, LMOs. Representatives from national concerned authorities, universities and NGO's are invited to the workshop and expected to discuss for one day the position of Egypt BCH and its integration within Egypt governmental institutions and non governmental organizations. For more information, write to Dr. Ossama Abdel-Kawy on elkawyo@gmail.com
In response to a direct request from the Parties to the Cartagena Protocol in Paragraph 13 of Decision BS-III/2 of the Conference of the Parties serving as the Meeting of the Parties to the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety (COP-MOP). the Biosafety Clearing-House (BCH) is now accessible in all six of the official languages of the United Nations (i.e. Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish). The translation has been completed for all public pages of the BCH’s Central Portal. The pages of the BCH Management Centre, only accessible to BCH account-holders to create and manage information, are also expected to be translated, following the revamping of this last section, by the end of 2008. Thanks to the UNEP-GEF BCH Project team a new ‘Help’ section of the BCH is also available from the Central Portal to help facilitate the use of the BCH. It is noted that the product is an output of the effective collaboration of the Secretariat and the BCH project. This integrated new ‘Help’ section has also been fully translated into the six official languages of the United Nations. All Parties, and other BCH users, are invited to provide the Secretariat with any feedback on these two important innovations. Read the notification.
The Environment General Authority ( http://www.environment.org.ly) in collaboration with UNEP-GEF will organize the national validation workshop on Libyan National Biosafety Framework, which was formulated by a group of Libyan experts and coordinated by Abdulmaula HAMZA as a national project coordinator. The workshop will be held on 23-24 April 2008, at the Libyan Marine Biology Research Centre in Tajoura (12 km E Tripoli) with participation from Dr Alex Osou-Biney the project coordinator in UNEP and Guest speaker Mdm Hazar Billy from NBF team of Tunisia. Representatives from national concerned authorities, universities and NGO's are expected to discuss for two days the position of Libyan regulatory system in relation with LMO's and Cartagena Protocol implementation. Libya joined the protocol on June 12, 2005. The workshop will include a visit to the premises of Libyan Biotechnology Research Centre, whom is a partner in preparation of the national framework; partners include also the National Bank for Plant Genetic Resources, The Libyan permanent committee on Bioethics and Biosecurity, the Libyan Society of Biotechnology. For more information, write to Abdulmaula HAMZA on egabiosafety@gmail.com
Organized by UNEP GEF project on Biosafety Clearing House Mechanism, The Environment General Authority was present at sub regional workshop on BCH, held in Marriott Hotel in Zamalek, Cairo, from 10-14 March 2008. [More...]
In accordance with requests made by both the COP-MOP and the BCH-IAC, a new online survey on the recently revamped BCH was released 1 December 2007. It is available at http://bch.cbd.int/survey/. The primary purpose of the survey is to obtain feedback from all BCH users, particularly with respect to user-friendliness and the quality of the information registered. The results of the survey will be collated and submitted for consideration by the Parties at their fourth meeting, being convened in Bonn 12-16 May 2008. This is being done as part of the review of the implementation of the Protocol envisaged in the medium-term programme of work.
We are pleased to announce the release of a revamped version of the BCH. We have put together an entirely-new layout that is in sync with the website for the Convention on Biological Diversity. The Homepage of the BCH and the first three sections on the new horizontal navigation bar (i.e. ‘The BCH’, ‘The Protocol’ and ‘Finding Information’) have been fully overhauled. However, much work remains to be done on the other sections (i.e. ‘Registering Information’, ‘Resources’ and ‘Help’). Below is a summary of the primary changes that have so far been made to the BCH: URL:The new URL of the Biosafety Clearing-House is http://bch.cbd.int/ and an automatic redirection is active from the previous URL. User friendliness: | The BCH layout is now in sync with the new CBD website that was released in May 2007. Also, navigation tools similar to the new CBD website have been optimized in order to allow for better identification of the primary sections of the site. |
| All common content between the BCH and the CPB websites have been unified and consolidated so that the BCH and the CPB websites mirror one another in this respect. This was done in order to avoid duplication and facilitate browsing. |
| All of the primary search interfaces in the ‘Finding Information’ section – which represent the “core” of the BCH – have been merged as much as possible in order to facilitate access to cross-referenced data and maximize the capacity of BCH users to retrieve information from the Central Portal. For example, the new version of the BCH contains approximately 40 primary links and 10 search interfaces as opposed to the 85 primary links and 22 search interfaces contained in the previous version. |
| Optional advanced search functions have been integrated into each primary search interface in order to reduce search time without compromising ease of use. |
| Grouping options have been enhanced in all search interfaces in order to allow for queries of all major geographical or political groupings of countries. |
| Country profiles, containing summary information with links to all information registered by individual countries, are now available from all of the BCH pages in the new horizontal navigation bar. |
| Records of the unique identifiers of LMOs now contain a new feature whereby BCH users can access country decisions (categorized according to ‘Domestic Use’, ‘Import’, ‘Environmental Release’ and ‘Other’) and risk assessments that are directly related to specific LMOs. |
Data Quality control: | Documentation available in the Biosafety Information Resource Centre (BIRC) has been divided into two databases. The first is for purely scientific articles published in international scientific journals and is maintained by the ICGEB (available at http://bch.cbd.int/database/bibliographic-references/). The second contains "grey" literature (e.g. reports and case studies; journals and newsletters; teaching materials, manuals, toolkits, presentations, etc., available at http://bch.cbd.int/database/resources/). Thanks to the kind contribution of the UNEP-GEF Biosafety Project, there has also been a significant increase of "grey" BIRC records (from 242 to over 700). |
Multilanguage enhancement: | Added functionality to multiple languages support for Hermes, Ajax and Central Portal. National languages, other than the 6 UN Official languages may now be technically implemented in all BCH features pending the availability of text translations from interested countries. |
La Convención interinstitucional para el desarrollo de capacidad nacional sobre el Centro de Intercambio de Información sobre Seguridad de la Biotecnología para Costa Rica, es un talller de capacitación dirigido a diferentes sectores públicos y privados que participan en el desarrollo del país, como medios de comunicación, industria biotecnológica, sociedad civil, organizaciones ambientalistas, Comisión Técnica Nacional de Bioseguridad, sector académico, políticos e instituciones de gobierno. El taller informará sobre los compromisos que Costa Rica ha adquirido con la ratificación del Protocolo de Cartagena, facilitará el intercambio de información y experiencia científica, técnica ambiental y jurídica en relación con los organismos vivos modificados, en cumplimiento del Artículo 20 del Protocolo de Cartagena sobre Seguridad de la Biotecnología. [More...]
The Final Report of the second meeting of the Informal Advisory Committee of the Biosafety Clearing-House (BCH-IAC), held from 23 to 24 November 2006 in Geneva is now available on the CBD website.
The second meeting of the BCH Informal Advisory Committee was held in Geneva from 23 to 24 November 2006. A summary of outcomes for this meeting is now available, pending publishing of the full report.
New features available in the October 2006 release of the BCH include:
The Secretariat has introduced an easily accessible organizations directory which includes a database that profiles the nature of work undertaken by each institution, focusing on its relevance to biosfaety, and provides detailed contact information as well as links to relevant records in the Biosafety Clearing-House. The Directory is available on-line in the ‘Information-sharing and networking mechanism’ section of the BCH at < http://bch.biodiv.org/informationsharing/default.shtml>
The Secretariat has introduced an easily accessible central registry of all living modified organisms, including information on the transformation event, gene insert and characteristics of the modification, and its unique identification code (if available). Links to all decisions that refer to one of these organisms are provided at the bottom of each LMO record accessible through the registry.
The final version of the Decisions adopted at COP/MOP-3, held from 13 to 17 March 2006 in Curitiba, Brazil, and the Final Report of the meeting are now available on the CBD website.
An advance version (subject to final editing and clearance) of the Decisions adopted at COP/MOP-3, held from 13 to 17 March 2006 in Curitiba, Brazil, is now available on the CBD website.
Delegates from Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean, Asia and the Pacific Islands attended the BCH training workshop, which offered training to eligible Parties in how to access and use the BCH, how to fulfill legal obligations to provide information, and an opportunity to explore options for national participation in the global interconnected system that supports the BCH Central Portal.
The Secretariat, with support from the UNEP-GEF Project for Building Capacity for Effective Participation in the BCH as part of its national training activity, is convening a hands-on training workshop to review the use of the main components of the BCH in the context of the Protocol implementation, and to provide an opportunity for governments to register their information with the BCH. The workshop will be held on 11-12 March 2006, in Curitiba.
Access to the complete text of the interim reports submitted to the Secretariat in accordance is now available through the BCH. Electronic facilities intended to assist users to aggregate and analyse data according to selected Parties, geographic area, economic groups and other criteria are also available. Where possible, courtesy translations may have been made available for reports submitted prior to the deadline for submission.
The Secretariat sent a notification to all Parties reminding them of their reporting obligations, and requested Parties and Governments to review their records to ensure the information in the database has been accurately reported and categorized.
The Secretariat has distributed a questionnaire to facilitate the submission of information on the progress in, and effectiveness of, the Action Plan for Building Capacities for the Effective Implementation of the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety. The questionnaire can be downloaded in word format, or completed on-line. Please follow this link for details. Responses are due before 15 November 2005.
A new controlled vocabulary has been developed to allow countries to indicate their specific capacity-building priorities with regard to socioeconomic considerations, when registering national capacity-building needs. Please follow this link to see the new vocabulary, or log-on through the Management Centre to update your existing records.
The BCH Thesaurus (i.e. the BCH controlled vocabulary, a pre-defined list of terms and related synonyms used in the BCH) can now be downloaded in XML format for use by developers. Please follow this link to view the thesaurus.
The regional search options have been expanded to allow additional regional searches, such as for Small Island Developing States, or European Union Members.
The search pages have been modified to allow users to select multiple options when searching the BCH databases. For multiple selections in the drop-down lists (e.g. country lists), please check the “multiple” heading above the search box and highlight the selections of interest by pressing the control key before clicking each term. For other lists (e.g. region lists), please select the appropriate options by using the check-boxes.
Multiple contact details may now be added when registering a Competent National Authority, allowing users to register information for more than one contact person within a single Authority. Please log in through the Management Centre and edit your existing records if you wish to create new titles for existing documents.
Users can now create file titles or descriptions for uploaded documents attached to their records. Please log in through the Management Centre and edit your existing records if you wish to create new titles for existing documents.
Keyword searches are now automatically parsed before being undertaken – unless otherwise specified, AND is added between terms. Parentheses can be used for complex searches, words can be grouped using quote marks and noise terms (such as "the" and "for") are filtered. For further information about searching options, please see the section on Boolean Searching examples in the BCH toolkit.
The Reporting Format for the Interim National Report on Implementation of the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety (Annex to MOP 1 Decision BS-I/9) is now available in all six official United Nations languages in the 'Downloadable Files' section of the BCH under 'BCH Forms'. All Parties are expected to submit the Interim National Report in this format to the Executive Secretary no later than 11 September 2005 in accordance with paragraph 5(i) of Decision BS-I/9.
The report is now available for the second meeting of the Conference of the Parties serving as the meeting of the Parties to the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety (document UNEP/CBD/BS/COP-MOP/2/15), held from 30 May to 3 June 2005 in Montreal. Please follow this link for the full text of the report (PDF).
COP-MOP 2 adopted a multi-year programme of work for the Biosafety Clearing-House which has five main strategic objectives, namely: 1) to improve ease of reporting and accessing information in the BCH; 2) to increase the amount of information that is currently being reported to the BCH and to ensure it is provided in a timely manner; 3) to make a broader range of biosafety information accessible to users of the BCH; 4) to enhance the capabilities of countries to access information through Internet-based BCH and to ensure that users without good Internet access are able to receive information made available through the BCH in a timely manner; and 5) to review the programme of work to ensure that is achieving the goals of the BCH effectively. The meeting also requested the Secretariat to continue to support capacity-building efforts to enable the active participation of countries in the BCH. Please follow this link to read the decision on operation and activities of the Biosafety Clearing-House (decision BS-II/2).
The new academic compendium includes a listing of recurrent biosafety education and training programs offered by academic and other relevant institutions around the world. Each entry contains a brief description of the program as well as a Web link and contact details for further information. Please follow this link to search the compendium...
Following the transition of the BCH from the pilot phase to the fully operational phase and adoption of modalities for its operation (decision BS-I/3), the Secretariat has received valuable feedback from Governments and organizations regarding several proposed improvements to its operation. Accordingly, the Biosafety Clearing-House website has been revised and enhanced. New features include the launch of the Biosafety Information Resource Centre; improved management of records with information in multiple languages; easier access for users with limited email access; improved accessibility and usability; new features for BCH National Focal Points and group users; and personalized databases in the BCH training site. [More...]
The Biosafety Capacity-Building Network is an interactive forum that links individuals from Government agencies and relevant organizations active in biosafety capacity-building activities. The primary purpose of the Network is to facilitate communication, active interaction and the exchange of information among Network members with a view to promoting partnerships, complementarities and synergies between various biosafety capacity-building initiatives.
The pre-sessional paper on the operation and activities of the Biosafety Clearing-House for the second meeting of the Parties to the Protocol ( UNEP/CBD/BS/COP-MOP/2/3), to be held in Montreal from 30 May to 3 June 2005, is now available through the CBD website.
The archived conference proceedings for the online conference on “GMOs in the management of animal populations”, which ran from 18 October to 15 November 2004, are now available. Some of the topics raised for discussion by participants during the online conference included: the appropriate timing of international consultation regarding disseminating LMOs, and incorporating frameworks for such consultation in decision-making (e.g., case-by-case workshops); mechanisms to limit or track disseminating LMOs spreading across international boundaries, such as safety mechanisms for making disseminating LMOs safer (e.g., building containment into recombinant bacteria, and current developments with genetically modified viruses); balancing the risks of using LMOs to control animal populations against the known damage to ecosystems associated with currently available control measures (e.g., cases where current measures fail to mitigate damage done by invasive alien species); and particular challenges in developing countries for managing risks, such as implications of poor understanding and education about LMOs.
At its first meeting, the Conference of the Parties serving as the meeting of the Parties to the Protocol adopted the modalities of operation of the Biosafety Clearing-House, which inter alia, mandated the Secretariat to seek assistance from an informal advisory committee, with a particular focus on providing guidance with respect to resolution of technical issues associated with the ongoing development of the Biosafety Clearing-House. Pursuant to this decision, the Secretariat has scheduled the first meeting of the informal advisory committee of technical experts on the Biosafety Clearing-House in Montreal on 9 to 10 November 2004. The composition of the meeting was determined by the Secretariat taking into account the participants’ demonstrated expertise and experience with the Biosafety Clearing-House, while ensuring regional and gender balance on the Committee, and is available in the relevant notification on the CBD website.
 Modern biotechnology can provide innovative approaches to management of animal populations, but what about potential risks? This online conference will facilitate exchange of views on a range of important issues such as the use of GM microorganisms, nematodes and insects for biological control (including those used to cause sterility in pest species for conservation and/or commercial purposes); the use of GM viruses to protect mammal populations against disease; and the use of GM insects for reducing disease transmission rates. The conference will be hosted on the Biosafety Clearing-House from 18 October to 15 November 2004. To subscribe, visit http://bch.biodiv.org/onlineconferences/gmoam.shtml or send an email to bchlistserv@biodiv.org with the subject line blank and the message "SUBSCRIBE GMOAM FirstName LastName" in the message body.
The Secretariat is in the process of preparing a longer-term programme of work for the operation of the BCH. We would like to seek your views to assist us in this task and invite you to participate in our survey. We would like all BCH users, or potential BCH users, to assist us in providing information through the questionnaire, so please feel free to distribute it widely among your colleagues. The questionnaire is available in hard-copy or electronically from the Secretariat, or via the BCH website, where it can be downloaded as a PDF or MS Word document, or completed on-line. [please note that the survey closed on 17 September 2004]
Registered National Focal Points of the BCH may now submit their own national (or regional) biosafety news to be featured on the BCH. This new feature will allow governments to ensure that their information is circulated widely to all users of the BCH. Use the “Add News Item” button on the BCH news page after logging in via the Management Centre.
The BCH Current Awareness Mailing List is now in operation. This service sends out regular updates summarizing new information that has been added to the BCH, sent directly to users by email (or to a specified fax number). The categories of information to be included in the summaries, and the frequency of their delivery are individually customizable for each user. Please see the mailing list page for further information.
Translation of the webpages and search functions of the Biosafety Clearing-House has been updated, and information is now available in all United Nations official languages: Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Spanish and Russian. Languages are available by clicking on the language buttons at right-hand side of the red bar underneath the CBD logo (or left-hand side for Arabic).
Because of the dynamic nature of the BCH, the pages need to be regularly updated. Updates are undertaken quarterly, depending on the availability of funds.
Following the approval of the transition of the Pilot Phase of the BCH to the fully operational phase, the website has been revised and enhanced. New developments include: | Improved search facilities (such as a living modified organism “quick search” that can retrieve information using the common name of an organism, the unique identification, and/or the modified trait). |
| A search engine that indexes the thousands of pages of biosafety websites and allows users to carry out a keyword search across them. |
| Redesigned presentation of content and improved help facilities to assist users in finding information (such as national contacts, laws and regulations, decision information, capacity-building activities, biosafety experts, and other resources), including “quick help” and glossary links through the site. |
The Secretariat welcomes your feedback. Please email us at bch@biodiv.org.
At its first meeting, the Conference of the Parties serving as the meeting of the Parties to the Protocol approved the transition of the Pilot Phase of the Biosafety Clearing-House to the operational phase, and adopted the modalities of operation of the Biosafety Clearing-House in accordance with the Article 20 of the Protocol. The BCH Central Portal will be updated in the next few weeks to reflect these changes.
A Simple National Biosafety Clearing-House Application (nBCH) has been developed by the Secretariat and can now be downloaded through the BCH. The nBCH is a software tool designed to achieve the following goals: Off-line BCH data entry Many BCH users may not have a permanent or reliable Internet connection. The nBCH allows a user to enter national information locally even if Internet access is not available. Data transfer to the Central Portal of the BCH Once national information has been entered into the nBCH, the data can be transferred to the Central Portal of the BCH, either via Internet interoperability or via export options. Reference tool for systems developers Countries interested in setting up their National BCH node may find it useful to see how a simple stand-alone application can communicate with the Central Portal of the BCH. Systems developers have full access to the source code and are welcome to build their own application based on the interoperability logic used by the nBCH.
BCH account holders can now edit their personal information in the "my profile" category that appears in the left-hand menu of the Management Centre after they have logged in. This facility enables users to specify, among other things, their preferred language and time zone, as well as managing other features such as enabling client certificate authentication.
The Biosafety Clearing-House discussion forums are a new tool the Secretariat is now offering in the effort to facilitate sharing of views and expertise on issues of relevance to the Biosafety Protocol, and in particular to assist people in the use of the BCH. Registration and participation in the forums is freely available to all users, including governmental and non-governmental organisations, policy makers and the general public, although some topics are more relevant for specific categories of users, such as BCH National Focal Points. The discussions are broadly divided into General and Technical. The topics available at the moment are: Getting Started, User Support, Feature Requests, Capacity-Building, Interoperability and the Simple National BCH. The forums are completely newsgroup-based and all users are requested to keep their posts strictly relevant to the topic at hand. The Secretariat moderates every list to ensure that spam and off-topic messages are not included in the posts. This may mean that there is a short delay (up to 24 hours) before your message shows up on the forum if it is your first post, and we apologize for any inconvenience. Please contact the Secretariat if you experience any difficulties in using the forums.
In response to several requests by organizations involved in capacity-building acitivities, it is now possible for users belonging to the same organization to share the ownership of their records. Capacity-building organizations are invited to contact the Secretariat in order to create a "group" of users for their organization, each of whom will be able to edit, validate or delete the organization's records (rather than just the owner of the record, which was previously the case).
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