The Commission said it hopes to reach agreement on the establishment of a global network of protected areas, indicators to measure biodiversity and strengthening access to genetic resources and equitable sharing of the benefits arising from their use.
The booming herbals industry will be significantly impacted by such measures. A report recently published by the UK conservation group Plantlife International estimates that some 1300 medicinal plants found in Europe are used commercially, with up to 90 per cent collected from the wild. And at the moment, wasteful harvesting techniques are commonplace, it said.
Plantlife claims that the medicinal plants industry needs to take action if the UK is to meet obligations set at the previous (6th) conference of the 188 parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity, agreed in 2002. These include ensuring that by 2010 at least 30 per cent of all plant-based products are derived from sustainably managed sources.
But a survey carried out by the group found only six of 17 herbal companies are growing even a small percentage of the medicinal plants they use. And despite growing awareness of the conservation problems associated with the botanicals industry, most companies were concerned that growing their own raw materials would not be viable in an uncertain market.
At the 7th Conference of the Parties (COP7) to the Biodiversity Convention, the Commission wants to implement the ground-breaking guidelines on access and benefit sharing, the so-called Bonn Guidelines, adopted in 2002 by the parties to the Biodiversity Convention. This concerns access for companies and research institutes to plant and animal resources and an obligation to share the financial and scientific benefits arising from their use with the owners or providers of this material.
The Commission issued a communication on the implementation of these Guidelines in the EU in December. Some parties, notably a group of developing countries with very rich biodiversity (the Mega-Diverse Group), want to go further and start negotiations now within the COP7 on a new instrument on access and benefit sharing. The Commission indicated that it would be prepared to consider further measures.
It also wants a decision on protected areas, with clear guidance on how they should be managed, and a global network of well managed regional and national protected areas on land by 2010 and at sea by 2012.
Other issues to be discussed at the conference, which runs to 20 February, include ways in which global biodiversity can be monitored and capacity building to help developing countries assess their biodiversity and make informed choices about enforcing legislation on access and benefit sharing.
The Commission is currently spending about 3 per cent of its development assistance, or around €190 million a year, on biodiversity conservation, sustainable use and benefit sharing, but says greater priority needs to be given to the links between biological diversity and poverty eradication.
"Kuala Lumpur must be a rallying point for action", said environment commissioner Margot Wallström. "We only have six years to go until 2010, the year by which world leaders have committed themselves to significantly reduce biodiversity loss. But global biodiversity is declining unchecked. We simply cannot afford to fail. The first ones to suffer from vanishing ecosystems will be the world's poor whose livelihoods often depend directly on biodiversity."