Nairobi, 1 July 2017: After four days of intensive deliberations, experts drawn from IGAD Member States completed the review of the draft Regional Biodiversity Protocol and its related strategies yesterday in Nairobi.
A team of consultants and the IGAD Secretariat will polish the documents and share them with the respective ministries in the Member States in a few days. The draft protocol and strategies will then be presented to the ministers responsible for biodiversity in a couple of weeks in Addis Ababa.
Closing the meeting that brought together members of the Technical Advisory and Programme Steering Committees of the IGAD Biodiversity Management Programme (BMP), the Director of Agriculture and Environment at the IGAD Secretariat, Mr Mohamed Moussa described the review process as a very important one leading to the adoption and expressed confidence that the documents would change the biodiversity management situation in the region. He called on the Member States to embrace the protocol and the strategies. Furthermore, he invited them to do the due diligence on the documents before the ministerial meeting in Addis Ababa.
Among the draft strategies reviewed include the one to control and manage invasive species, conservation of transboundary wildlife and sharing of biodiversity benefits. The participants also looked at a draft strategy on domestication of regional, continental and global instruments.
The IGAD BMP organized the meeting with the support of the European Union bringing senior government officials from Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan and Uganda.
For further information, please contact:
Dr Debalkew Berhe| Programme Manager, Environment Protection | IGAD Secretariat |
E-mail: debalkew.berhe@igad.int
