Attracting the largest number of participants in the history of the Convention, a record participation of stakeholders and an unprecedented series of side events, the eighth Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity concluded negotiations with few substantive results.

CBD COP-8 was held from 20-31 March 2006, in Curitiba, Brazil, immediately following the third Meeting of the Parties (COP/MOP-3) to the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety, and attracted approximately 3,900 delegates representing parties and other governments, UN agencies, intergovernmental, non-governmental, indigenous and local community organizations, academia and industry.
In terms of substantive achievements, the adoption of the new island biodiversity work programme was hailed as a success by small island developing States, while the decision to reaffirm the COP-5 ban on field testing of genetic use restriction technologies and reject case-by-case risk assessments was celebrated by many countries, NGOs and indigenous representatives. However, on the two topics that largely dominated the meeting’s agenda, access and benefit-sharing (ABS) and marine protected areas, discussions focused on process. The decision on ABS focused on identifying future steps with regard to the negotiation of an international regime on ABS, while discussions on marine protected areas sought to redefine the Convention’s role in relation to high seas protected areas.
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IISDRS coverage of the meeting