Notification 2006-131

Dear Madam/Sir, Pursuant to Decision BS-III/2 of the third meeting of the Conference of the Parties serving as the meeting of the Parties to the Protocol (COP-MOP), and in accordance with the multi-year programme of work for the Biosafety Clearing-House (BCH) adopted at COP-MOP-2, I am pleased to announce the implementation of a number of new features in the Central Portal to facilitate and improve access to and use of the BCH. The main new additional features include the following: A new background saving feature, which automatically saves every 5 minutes a temporary copy of a record being registered or updated in the Management Center. Should an interruption occur, the draft would be restored to its last saved state; An improved publishing mechanism, which will allow users to actively publish several interlinked records at the same time; An ability for users to link decision and risk assessment records to the BCH Living Modified Organism Registry maintained by the Secretariat in order to avoid any duplication. A warning message will display if one creates a new LMO record; A safer un-publishing mechanism, which will ensure that cross-referenced records cannot be inadvertently deleted; A more flexible way of displaying search results by allowing users to sort displayed results by different criteria; Improved common formats for capacity-building project and opportunity records, which allow linkages between these records and the relevant organizations in the BCH Directory of Organizations involved in Biosafety Activities. A redesigned news submission feature, which is now accessible through the Management Center of the BCH and allows National Focal Points and National Authorized Users to submit national news items to the BCH `What’s New` page. I would like to take this opportunity to thank the many governments and organizations that are making their information available through the BCH. I encourage all users to send any feedback and suggestions for improvement of the Biosafety Clearing-House to the Secretariat through bch@biodiv.org, or to Philippe Leblond, Computer Information Systems Officer for the BCH (philippe.leblond@biodiv.org, +1 514 287-8717). Please accept, Madam/Sir, the assurances of my highest considerations.

Executive Secretary

To: BCH National Focal Points Cc: Cartagena Protocol National Focal Points (or CBD Focal Points where Biosafety Focal Points have not yet been nominated) BCH Mailing List