With the view to improving the Guidance on Risk Assessment of LMOs, participants of the Open-ended Group and the AHTEG are invited to make proposals as to ways of revising the current version of the Guidance on the basis of the results of the scientific review process, ie. the comments received from the Parties, other governments and organizations.

Participants are encouraged to make their recommendations on improving the Guidance by working directly on the text of the current version of the Guidance (in English). Please provide your recommendations in "track changes" mode and collated in one MS Word file that should be attached to a message posted in the discussion group.

This discussion will be open from 28 March to 11 April 2011 (1:00am GMT).

Topic 2: Possible mechanisms, including criteria, for future updates of the lists of background materials

At the end of each section of the "Guidance on Risk Assessment of LMOs", a link to background documents is available. The lists of background documents were prepared by the Open-ended Online Group and AHTEG as reference to the various sections of the Guidance.

At their last meeting, the Parties to the Protocol mandated the Open-ended Online Group and AHTEG to propose mechanisms for future updates of these lists of background materials.

Under this topic of discussion, Participants to the Open-ended Online Group and AHTEG will be invited to focus on "who" should be responsible for selecting the documents for the list and what "criteria" should be used for the selection of relevant background documents to be included in the list taking into account the long-term sustainability of any proposed mechanism.

This discussion will be open from 11 to 18 April 2011 (1:00am GMT).

Topic 3: New specific topics of risk assessment for the development of further guidance

During the previous intersessional period, the Open-ended Online Group and AHTEG identified topics for further development of guidance.

Under this discussion, from the list of identified topics, participants are invited to indicate, in his/her opinion and taking into account the needs from Parties, which are the 5 (five) most important topics in order of priority for the development of additional guidance.

Suggested format: to facilitate the exchange of views, it is recommended that each message posted in this discussion group shows, at the top, a list of five selected topics (from the 1st to 5th in order of priority) followed by the exact titles as indicated in the list of identified topics. Explanatory comments on why the topics were chosen may be added after the list.

This discussion will be open from 11 to 18 April 2011 (1:00am GMT).