4 July 2011: A recent regional workshop on updating National Biodiversity Strategies and Action Plans (NBSAPs) gathered biodiversity experts and officials from 14 European countries.

Held from 30 June-1 July 2011, in Geneva, Switzerland, the workshop was organized by the Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), with financial support from the Government of Japan, and in collaboration with the Regional Office for Europe of the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and the Pan-European Biological and Landscape Diversity Strategy (PEBLDS) Bureau. It was attended by experts and officials from Albania, Armenia, Belarus, Croatia, Finland, Georgia, Montenegro, Norway, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, the Russian Federation, Serbia, Switzerland, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. Representatives of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands of International Importance, and the World Conservation Monitoring Centre (WCMC) also participated.

The workshop aimed to: strengthen national capacities for the development, implementation, reviewing, updating, and communication of NBSAPs; help facilitate national implementation of the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity 2011-2020; and translate it into national targets and commitments. During the workshop, participants reviewed the findings of the third edition of the Global Biodiversity Outlook (GBO-3) and their relevance to the outcomes of the 10th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the CBD (COP 10); reviewed progress on updating NBSAPs, especially with regard to mainstreaming; and discussed synergies between the biodiversity-related conventions in the context of the Strategic Plan, focusing on national experience with CITES and Ramsar in particular. Participants also considered the relationship between targets and indicators, and undertook a number of group exercises in NBSAP revision in light of the Strategic Plan. [CBD Communiqué]