The Ad Hoc Open-ended Working Group on Access and Benefit-Sharing (the Working Group) met at the International Congress Center Bundeshaus, in Bonn, Germany, from 22 to 26 October 2001.

The Working Group was established pursuant to decision V/26, paragraph 11, in which the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity decided "to establish an Ad Hoc Open-ended Working Group, composed of representatives, including experts, nominated by Governments and regional economic integration organisations, with the mandate to develop guidelines and other approaches for submission to the Conference of the Parties and to assist Parties and stakeholders in addressing the following elements as relevant to access to genetic resources and benefit-sharing, inter alia:

• Terms for prior informed consent and mutually agreed terms
• Roles, responsibilities and participation of stakeholders
• Relevant aspects relating to in situ and ex situ conservation and sustainable use
• Mechanisms for benefit-sharing, for example through technology transfer and joint research and development;
• And means to ensure the respect, preservation and maintenance of knowledge, innovations and practices of indigenous and local communities embodying traditional lifestyles relevant for the conservation and sustainable use of biological diversity,

Taking into account, inter alia work by the World Intellectual Property Organization on intellectual property rights issues."

In accordance with paragraph 11, section A of decision V/26, the Ad Hoc Working Group on access and benefit-sharing was "composed of representatives, including experts, nominated by Governments and regional economic integration organizations. The Working Group was open to the participation of indigenous and local communities, non-governmental organizations, industry and scientific and academic institutions, as well as intergovernmental organizations."

The work of the Working Group took into account the reports of two meetings of the Panel of Experts on Access and Benefit-sharing (UNEP/CBD/COP/5/8 and UNEP/CBD/WG-ABS/1/2), as well as other relevant information.</p>

In order to build capacity for access and benefit-sharing, the COP also requested the Working Group to consider issues of capacity-building, including:

• Assessment and inventory of biological resources as well as information management;
• Contract negotiation skills;
• Legal drafting skills for development of access and benefit-sharing measures;
• Means for the protection of traditional knowledge associated with genetic resources.

In paragraph 15 of decision V/26 A, the COP also noted that the Panel of Experts on Access and Benefit-sharing was not able to come to any conclusions about the role of intellectual property rights in the implementation of access and benefit-sharing arrangements and that a list of specific issues had been identified for further study:

• The role of intellectual property rights in prior informed consent
• Intellectual property and traditional knowledge related to genetic resources
• Intellectual property rights and access and benefit-sharing agreements
• Scope, prior art and monitoring

The COP invited Parties and relevant organizations to submit to the Executive Secretary information on these issues and requested the Executive Secretary, on the basis of these submissions and other relevant material, to make available to the Ad-Hoc Open-ended Working Group, a report on these specific issues. As requested by the COP, a report has been prepared for consideration by the Working Group.

The Ad Hoc Open-ended Working Group on ABS successfully concluded its work on 26 October 2001 with the adoption of recommendations to be submitted to the COP at its sixth meeting. The first recommendation to the COP regards the finalization and adoption of Draft Bonn Guidelines on Access to Genetic Resources and Fair and Equitable Sharing of the Benefits Arising out of their Utilization. Additional recommendations of the Working Group relate to other approaches, including the development of an action plan for capacity-building and to the role of intellectual property rights in the implementation of access and benefit-sharing arrangements. The final report of the Working Group is available as document UNEP/CBD/COP/6/6.

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