Linkages Convention on Biological Diversity COP-3 -- Interviews

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Diego Malpede, Delegation of Argentina

Friday 15 November 1996

Intellectual property rights: Malpede said COP-3's decision on intellectual property rights initiates a process of collaboration on the issue with the World Trade Organization and others.

Diego Malpede is a member of Argentina's Permanent Mission in Geneva, Switzerland, a delegate to several international negotiations and the person who led the informal negotiations on intellectual property rights (IPR) at COP-3. At the conclusion of COP-3,

Malpede spoke with ENB editors Kira Schmidt and Steve Wise on the actions taken IPR.

(Total Length: 14:17)

Carlos Saul Menem, President of Argentina

Wednesday 13 November 1996

"Un nuevo contrato natural": Menem compared the need for new approaches to conservation with the political innovations of the social contract in the 18th Century, as CBD Executive Secretary Calestous Juma and COP-3 President Maria Julia Alsogaray look on.

President Carlos Saul Menem of Argentina quoted poetry, scripture and General Juan Peron in his call Wednesday for a halt to humankind's destruction of nature. Speaking during COP-3's Ministerial Segment,

Menem said the need to maintain an equilibrium with nature is a theme running through a series of regional and global negotiations, but that it is time to go beyond the desert full of words and dialectic these discussions have created. He suggested a global program to halt and address all causes of deforestation and noted the CBD's provisions to learn from indigenous cultures.

In Spanish Only (Total Length: 11:17)

Aniceto B. Montellano, Centro Comunitario Finca Potrero
and Wenceslao Simón Villanueva, Consejo de Acontecimientos Aborigines

Friday 8 November 1996

Bio-rythms: Taking a break between negotiations, NGO participants Montellano and Villanueva played music in the hall of the Centro Dorado.

NGO representatives Aniceto B. Montellano, a Golla, and Wenceslao Simón Villanueva, an Aymara, finished the first week of COP-3 on a

musical note. With negotiations either paused or in working groups and informal discussions, the ENB sought other sounds over the weekend.

(Total Length: 0:57)

Violet Ford, Inuit Circumpolar Conference
Terry Williams, Tulalip Tribes
Fred Fortier, First Nations of British Columbia

Thursday 7 November 1996

Left to right: Williams, Ford and Fortier: management of biodiversity under the CBD can unite indigenous and local communties and support both ecological and cultural survival.

Violet Ford is an environmental researcher in Ottawa, Canada with the Inuit Circumpolar Conference, an international group representing about 120,000 Inuit in Canada, Alaska, Greenland and Russia. Terry Williams is a representative of the Tulalip Tribes of Washington, USA and the state's Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission. Fred Fortier is a spokesperson for the First Nations in British Colombia, Canada and that counry's Assembly of First Nations.

Following a discussion in the COP of the issue, Ford, Williams and Fortier spoke Thursday with ENB editors Désirée McGraw and Steve Wise on the relationship between indigenous and local communties and biodiversity and about the Biodiversity Convention's article 8j, which requires that parties "respect, preserve and maintain knowledge, innovations and practices of indigenous and local communities" related to biodiversity.

They reviewed proposals by indigenous groups during Thursday's debate, potential for indigenous peoples to unite efforts under the CBD, and the relationship of biodiversity to forest and fisheries management issues. They emphasized their desire for greater participation in the management of ecosystems, and the interdependence of ecological and cultural survival.

(Total Length: 9:57)

Edwin Barnes, Department of Environment, Science and Technology, Ghana

Wednesday 6 November 1996

Barnes: management of access to genetic resources that protects indigenous and local communities benefits the global community.

Edwin Barnes is director of projects for Ghana's Department of Environment, Science and Technology. He spoke Wednesday with ENB editors Daniel Putterman and Steve Wise about access to genetic resources, a major issue of CBD Article 15. He discussed the importance to developing countries of managing genetic resources, and ways that the Biodiversity Convention's concepts of national sovereignty over genetic resource can protect biodiversity while benefitting providers and users of resources.

(Total Length: 6:28)

Vandana Shiva

Tuesday 5 November 1996

Shiva: agriculture must gain a "biodiversity consciousness."

Dr. Vandana Shiva of India is an internationally renowned expert on traditional agricultural practices with the Third World Network and the Research Foundation for Science, Technology and Ecology. After addressing the Conference of Parties on agricultural biodiversity, she spoke with ENB editors Désirée McGraw, Kira Schmidt, and Steve Wise.

Shiva said that incorporating biodiversity conservation is at the heart of food security and sustainable development and that traditional agricultural practices provide important lessons for modern agriculture. She also discussed trade and intellectual property negotiations occurring outside the CBD, suggesting that these other negotiations need to develop a "biodiversity consciousness." Finally, she explained how farmers' rights and protection of indigenous and local knowledge can be promoted through the CBD and other international negotiations.

(Total Length: 7:41)

GEF Chief Executive Officer Mohamed El-Ashry

Monday 4 November 1996

El-Ashry: optimistic that eventual permanent designation as the Biodiversity Convention's financial mechanism is "an automatic thing"

After his address to the Conference of Parties Monday, Global Environment Facility Chief Executive Officer

Mohamed El-Ashry spoke with Earth Negotiations Bulletin Editors Désirée McGraw, Lynn Wagner and Steve Wise. He said he hoped an improved relationship between the GEF and Biodiversity Convention Parties would lead to more effective implementation of the goals of the Convention.

(Total Length: 6:42)