South African Yearbook of International Law

Literature

Treaties and Literature

A landmark event that coincided with the adoption of the United Nations 1992 Rio Declaration on Environment and Development was the signing ceremony for the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) which entered into force on 29 December 1993. Considered an historic commitment by the international community to bring into operation an international legal instrument for the conservation and sustainable use of the earth's biological diversity and for the fair and equitable sharing of the benefits arising from the use of genetic resources, the convention's field of application was expanded, over time, by two additional protocols. In 2000 the Cartagena Protocol on Biodiversity was adopted and entered into force in 2003 with the aim of ensuring the safe handling, transport and use of living modified organisms (LMOs) resulting from modern biotechnology. Article 27 of this Protocol instructed the Conference of the Parties (COP) under the CBD, and serving as the Meeting of the Parties (MOP) under the Protocol, to develop an international liability and redress regime for damage resulting from the transboundary movement of LMOs. The adoption of the Nagoya-Kuala Lumpur Supplementary Protocol to the CBD followed in 2010 to realise the instruction in article 27 of the Cartagena Protocol.