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In the 1990s, the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) emerged as the primary international forum for managing the interface between biodiversity and biotechnology. Three legally binding protocols to the Convention were concluded, all aiming to regulate bio-innovation. Despite the rapid pace of biotechnological innovation, however, and its implications for biodiversity and equity, CBD policy outcomes have recently shifted towards lower stringency in substance and weaker institutionalization in process. To confirm this trend, we examine decisions adopted by the CBD Conferences of the Parties in 2022 and 2024. We focus on outcomes on three key agenda items: (i) digital sequence information on genetic resources, (ii) risk assessment of living modified organisms, and (iii) synthetic biology. We analyze shifts towards lower stringency in the light of scholarship on legalization and de-legalization, including the softening of international law. We conclude by assessing the implications for the CBD, and for global biotechnology governance more generally.

The Aichi targets are organised under five strategic goals: addressing the underlying causes of biodiversity loss by mainstreaming biodiversity across government and society; reducing the direct pressures on biodiversity and promoting sustainable use; improving the status of biodiversity by safeguarding ecosystem, species and genetic diversity; enhancing the benefits to all from biodiversity and ecosystem services; and enhancing implementation through participatory planning, knowledge management and capacity building. Preparations for the post-2020 global biodiversity framework started in 2016, when CBD COP-13 requested the CBD Executive Secretary to prepare a proposal for a preparatory process and timetable, for consideration by the Convention's Subsidiary Body on Implementation (SBI).5 On the basis of the SBI's recommendation, CBD COP-14 adopted a process for the preparation of a post-2020 global biodiversity framework.6 This preparatory process was to be Party-led and guided by a series of principles. The Subsidiary Body on Scientific, Technical and Technological Advice (SBSTTA) has been considering the draft framework from a scientific and technical perspective,8 and reviewing possible elements, including any implications arising from global assessments such as the Global Assessment on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services, prepared under the Intergovernmental SciencePolicy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services.9 The SBI was also intended to consider the draft from the point of view of means to support and review implementation, at its third meeting, which was originally scheduled to take place from 24-29 August 2020 in Montreal, Canada, immediately following the 24th meeting of SBSTTA (which has since been tentatively rescheduled for 2-7 November 2020).10 A discussion paper prepared by the CBD Secretariat11 provided a synthesis of submissions received, and served as a basis for a series of global, regional and thematic consultation meetings.12 The discussion paper outlined the main areas for discussion and decision-making, stemming from prior deliberations and submissions. The paper also addressed implementation at different levels, touching upon the relationship between the Convention and its Protocols, indicators, NBSAPs, and resource mobilisation and finance.13 1.The First Meeting of the Working Group The first meeting of the Working Group on the post-2020 framework convened from 27-30 August 2019 in Nairobi, Kenya.14 Participants, including Parties and observers, heard reports on consultations conducted and contributions received; discussed the possible elements of the post-2020 framework; and adopted conclusions regarding the future steps for its preparation.

Assessment of Progress Towards Selected Aichi Targets The Strategic Plan for Biodiversity 2011-2020 (October 2010, Nagoya, Japan) included 20 targets (the Aichi targets) organised under five strategic goals: addressing the underlying causes of biodiversity loss by mainstreaming biodiversity across government and society; reducing the direct pressures on biodiversity and promoting sustainable use; improving the status of biodiversity by safeguarding ecosystems, species and genetic diversity; enhancing the benefits to all from biodiversity and ecosystem services; and enhancing implementation through participatory planning, knowledge management and capacity building. The following are a few highlights among the actions that Parties and others are urged and invited to undertake: * Target 1 (awareness of the values of biodiversity and possible steps to conserve and use it sustainably): to develop communication strategies and tools for education and awareness raising as a means to promote behavioural change for the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity. * Target 3 (incentives and subsidies): to eliminate, phase out or reform perverse incentives that contribute to biodiversity degradation and to apply positive incentives that reward the adoption of sustainable practices. * Target 5 (loss, degradation and fragmentation of natural habitats, including forests): to take further efforts to address regional forest degradation and deforestation, and to reduce the loss and degradation of other ecosystems. * Target 7 (sustainable management of agricultural areas): to promote the conservation and sustainable use of soil biodiversity and to improve enforcement and monitoring of sustainable forest management and the sustainability of the timber trade. * Targets 11 (protected areas conservation) and 12 (species conservation): to \"focus on the protection, management and conservation of the most significant areas for biodiversity, ... through protected areas, other effective area-based conservation measures and specific species conservation measures\". * For Target 13 (genetic diversity): to \"avoid further reduction in genetic variation among breeds of farmed and domesticated animals, and promote in-situ conservation in centres of origin and genetic diversity\". * For Target 19 (biodiversity-related knowledge): to \"further promote and facilitate the mobilization of open-access biodiversity-related data and information, considering the voluntary guidance to improve the accessibility of biodiversity data and information adopted at COP-13\".6 Over the next two years, the international community will review successes and failures in the context of the implementation of the Strategic Plan and negotiate a global biodiversity framework for the post-2020 era, while continuing to address the impacts of new technologies on biodiversity conservation and sustainable use, and fair and equitable benefit sharing. Conflicts of Interest Concluding a multi-session discussion, COP-14 adopted a procedure for avoiding or managing conflicts of interest, which aims to enhance transparency and to contribute to ensuring the scientific integrity and independence of the work of expert groups.8 As used in the decision, \"conflict of interest\" refers to \"any current circumstances or interest that could lead a person to reasonably believe that an individual's objectivity in carrying out his or her duties and responsibilities for a specific expert group may be in question or that an unfair advantage may be created for any person or organization\" and is differentiated from \"bias\".9 The procedure is of particular interest to the work of the Convention and its Protocols on technological innovation, such as modern biotechnology, synthetic biology, and DSI, due to the strong interest of industry and academia in such technological applications. The COP/MOPs Deliberations by the Protocols' respective COP/ MOPs focused mainly on future work: * The Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety established an AHTEG on risk assessment and risk management. * The Nagoya Protocol COP/MOP о recognised that cooperation with the World Health Organization and the relationship of the Protocol with the Pandemic Influenza Preparedness (PIP) Framework has emerged as a crucial issue with regard to exchange of pathogens and linkages between ABS requirements and public health issues; and о determined that intersessional work will continue on two implementation issues: \"specialized\" international ABS instruments as mentioned in Article 4(4) of the Protocol, and the establishment of a global multilateral benefit-sharing mechanism as set forth in Article 10.

Not only cutting across all such sectors, but also considering other biodiversity issues, the Report aims to provide a comprehensive picture of the state of the conservation and use of the entire range of the world's biodiversity for food and agriculture, and its contributions to food security and nutrition, human wellbeing, and environmental health.2 Biodiversity for food and agriculture is understood to include the diversity of animals, plants and microorganisms at the genetic, species and ecosystem levels that sustain structures, functions and processes in and around production systems, and provide food and nonfood agricultural products. Prepared under the guidance of FAO's Commission on Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture, the Report was launched in February 2019, during the Commission's Seventeenth Regular Session (CGRFA-17).3 It was lauded as a major milestone and as a major input to the development of the post-2020 global biodiversity framework, which will be negotiated in the upcoming biennium for adoption at the 15th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity,4 and to the achievement of several of the UN's Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). In a nutshell, following an introduction on what is biodiversity for food and agriculture and challenges for the international community, the Report analyses the spectrum of issues relating to biodiversity for food and agriculture: * the contributions that it makes to ecosystem services, the resilience of production systems, sustainable intensification of agriculture, livelihoods, and food security and nutrition; * the major drivers of change affecting it; * the status and trends of its various components, including plant, animal, forest and aquatic resources, as well as associated biodiversity issues, such as soil biodiversity and pollinators; * the state of management practices and approaches, of characterisation, and of conservation; * t he state of policies, institutions and capacities that support its conservation and sustainable use; and * needs and challenges in its management. Status and Trends The first and perhaps most important message of the Report relates to the fundamental recognition that biodiversity - both that which is directly used for food and agriculture, including domesticated crops and animals, harvested forest and aquatic species, and the associated biodiversity found in and around production systems - is indispensable to food security, sustainable development, and the supply of many ecosystem services.

The core of the Treaty is its Multilateral System of Access and Benefit Sharing (MLS), which aims to reflect the nature of plant genetic resources for food and agriculture as a more generally held \"public good\", for which the bilateral system of exchanges contemplated by the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) was considered unsuitable.4 The broader landscape of genetic-resource governance (including the role of the ITPGRFA) changed considerably following adoption and subsequent entry into force of the CBD Nagoya Protocol on ABS,5 which built on the CBD's bilateral approach to ABS.6 The Treaty also includes major provisions regarding local and indigenous communities and farmers,7 as well as guidance regarding the conservation and sustainable use of covered resources.8 The meeting reported in this article focused significant attention on the MLS - a system aimed at facilitating access to, and exchange of, genetic resources of a list of crops (covering 35 crop genera and 29 forage species, specified in Annex I of the Treaty) considered vital for food security and agricultural research.9 Through the MLS, the ITPGRFA institutionalises the sharing of monetary and non-monetary benefits arising from the utilisation of these resources.10 Users of these MLS materials pay monetary benefits arising from their commercialisation of products developed on the basis of the material. [...]payments are made according to the provisions of a document known as the Standard Material Transfer Agreement (SMTA), which is generally in the form of a standardised private law contract signed by providers and users.11 Such payments, together with voluntary donations, are directed to the Treaty's Benefitsharing Fund, which allocates funds, under the direction of the Governing Body, to particular activities designed to support farmers in developing countries conserve crop diversity in their fields, and assist farmers and breeders globally to adapt crops to changing needs and demands. [...]agreement was not even reached on continuing some sort of intersessional work on these matters. [...]the first user-based payment realised since the Treaty's entry into force took place in June 2018, and concerned the commercialisation of vegetable varieties not included in the MLS. [...]that payment of benefit share was made on the basis of national legislation, which was of a type found in few user countries, under which use of the SMTA was mandatory for all uses of any plant genetic resources for food and agriculture.14 As a result of the lack of proceeds, the Treaty's primary benefit-sharing mechanism - the Benefit-sharing Fund - has been operating solely on the basis of donor country voluntary contributions.

In this article, we assess the application of the open-source development model in the field of agricultural research and development, as a potential tool for upholding both public scientific research, and farmer-led innovation and farmers’ rights. First, we provide an overview of the problems associated with the rise of IPRs in agriculture in view of global challenges such as food security and environmental sustainability, and present the debate on farmers’ rights, including its rationale and international policy and legal responses. We then review open source initiatives in the digital domain, including successes and shortcomings, and offer our understanding of relevant terminologies. We explore the parallels between software development and innovation in agriculture and review ongoing open-source agriculture-related initiatives. We particularly address the potential for open-source systems to address existing asymmetries in capabilities and contribute to global challenges such as food security.

The MLS aimed to respond to the specificities of agricultural biodiversity and the \"public good\" nature of PGRFA and basic scientific research in general,3 for which the CBD bilateral system of exchanges was considered unsuitable.4 PGRFA exchange is indispensable for the continuation of agricultural research, as well as for the adaptation of key crops to the new conditions brought about by climate change, and plant pests and diseases. [...]when it comes to crop genetic resources, all countries are interdependent, and identification of the country of origin is often difficult, given the millennia of agricultural history. The Treaty recognises the enormous contribution of local and indigenous communities and farmers to the conservation and development of plant genetic resources, and calls on the Parties to protect and promote farmers' rights, including by protecting traditional knowledge, the right to equitably participate in sharing benefits arising from the utilisation of PGRFA, and the right to participate in national-level decision making.8 The Treaty also provides guidance to countries regarding measures and activities to be undertaken to promote the conservation and sustainable use of PGRFA, highlighting the importance of adopting a complementary approach between in-situ and ex-situ conservation, maintaining diverse farming systems and implementing participatory approaches to plant breeding.9 The Treaty's supporting components include the rolling Global Plan of Action for PGRFA, its relationship to the ex-situ collections of agricultural samples in the centres that are connected through the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research,10 the international plant genetic resources networks, the Global Information System on PGRFA and the reports on The State of the World's PGRFA.11 Internationally, the landscape for genetic resource governance changed considerably following the adoption and subsequent entry into force of the CBD Nagoya Protocol on ABS,12 which built on the CBD's bilateral approach to ABS.13 The preamble to the Nagoya Protocol recognises the special nature of agricultural biodiversity, the interdependence of all countries and the importance of genetic resources for food security worldwide, and acknowledges the fundamental role of the ITPGRFA, specifically recalling its MLS.14 On-going Revision of the MLS The Treaty is considered to have facilitated millions of exchanges of PGRFA, mainly to enable public agricultural research, and is also credited with providing the necessary support for building the capacities required for PGRFA utilisation.15 A set of challenges have however arisen with regard to the ability of the MLS to generate and share monetary benefits.16 Specifically, no user-based payments have been realised since the Treaty's entry into force. Outlook PGRFA management is at the intersection between food security, agriculture and the environment. [...]the Treaty provides a critical element in international governance - an effective policy response to the global challenges of crop diversity loss, the need for sustainable food production and climate change adaptation. [...]the next session of the Governing Body, which is expected to be held in the second half of 2019, it is hoped that genetic resource governance will continue to evolve in a manner that successfully responds to these and other challenges.