Niger

The Republic of Niger is a Party to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) and its Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety. The country has established a comprehensive national biosafety framework, supported by Law No. 2019-48 and its implementing Decree No. 2020-492, as well as the National Biosafety Strategy (2020) and its associated Action Plan (2021–2025).

Niger is actively strengthening institutional, technical, and regulatory capacities to ensure the safe handling, transfer, and use of living modified organisms (LMOs), including emerging issues such as synthetic biology. The Ministry of Environment, through the Directorate General of Water and Forests and the National Biosafety Coordination Unit, plays a central and operational role in the effective implementation, coordination, and oversight of biosafety policies and regulatory mechanisms at the national level, in close collaboration with national biotechnology laboratories, research centres, public universities, relevant sectoral ministries, and civil society organisations.

Dr Mahamadou Alhassane is the officially designated National Biosafety Focal Point of Niger, appointed by Ministerial Order No. 0026/ME/LCD/SG/DGEF/DRH/DGC dated 03 February 2023, replacing Dr Mahaman Gado Zaki following his retirement. He also serves as the national focal point for the Biosafety Clearing-House (BCH) and as the contact point for emergency measures under Article 17 of the Cartagena Protocol, as formally communicated to the CBD Secretariat.

To effectively meet its international obligations and strengthen national expertise, the country has established, under the leadership of the National Biosafety Focal Point, a National Network of Experts in Biotechnology, Biosafety, and Biodiversity. This multidisciplinary platform brings together leading scientists, regulatory experts, laboratory specialists, academia, and key stakeholders from relevant institutions nationwide. The network serves as a strategic technical backbone to support risk assessment, decision-making, policy development, biosurveillance, and the implementation of obligations under the Cartagena Protocol and related frameworks.

Members of the network meet on a regular basis through technical sessions, workshops, and coordination meetings, ensuring continuous knowledge exchange, harmonization of approaches, and rapid mobilization of national expertise in response to emerging biosafety challenges, including those related to synthetic biology. This initiative represents a significant step forward in consolidating a robust, science-based, and coordinated national biosafety system and stands as a highly impactful and exemplary model of national ownership and capacity-building.

Niger is currently undertaking institutional reforms to establish a Permanent Biosafety Secretariat to further strengthen national coordination, risk assessment, biosurveillance, compliance, and enforcement capacities.

The country places strong emphasis on capacity-building, regional cooperation within the West African Economic and Monetary Union (UEMOA) and the Sahel region, and alignment with the Kunming–Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, while consolidating achievements and lessons learned from the implementation of the National Biosafety Action Plan (2021–2025) and preparing for GEF-9 programming priorities (2026–2030).