Welcoming the financial support of
the Global Environment Facility for eligible Parties to prepare and
submit their national reports and recognizing the
contribution of that support to the high rate of submission of
these reports;
Noting that 14 Parties have not yet
submitted their second national reports and that five of those
Parties have never fulfilled their reporting obligations under
Article 33 of the Protocol,
Recognizing that there are some
discrepancies between the information contained in the second
national reports and the information made available by Parties
through the Biosafety Clearing-House,
1.Welcomes the high rate of
submissions of second national reports by Parties and takes
note of the analysis of responses prepared by the Executive
Secretary;
2.Reminds Parties of their
obligation to submit national reports, in accordance with Article
33 of the Protocol;
3.Urges the 14 Parties that
have not yet submitted their national reports to do so at the
earliest opportunity by fully completing the report form for the
second national report, as contained in the annex to
decision
BS-V/14;
4.Alsourges those
Parties that have not yet responded fully to all mandatory
questions in the second national report to cooperate with the
Secretariat in order to complete their second national reports as
soon as possible;
5.Reminds Parties of
paragraph 2 of
decision
BS-V/14, which requests Parties submitting their national
report for the first time to use the reporting format for the
second national report, and
decides that all Parties
should complete this form before using any simplified reporting
format that may be adopted in the future;
6.Further reminds Parties of
their obligation to make available to the Biosafety Clearing House
the information required under paragraph 3 of Article 20 of the
Protocol;
7.Encourages Parties to
facilitate the preparation and submission of their national reports
by exploring and utilizing, as appropriate: (i) the technical and
other resources available in existing bilateral, subregional and
regional arrangements; and (ii) the roster of biosafety
experts;
8.Requests the Executive
Secretary to assess, on the basis of the second national reports,
the discrepancies and/or gaps in information made available by
Parties through the Biosafety Clearing-House, and to assist Parties
to submit, through the Biosafety Clearing-House and without further
delay, the updated information contained in their reports;
9.Also requests the
Executive Secretary to update the reporting format, taking into
account the experience gained from analysing the second national
reports, the recommendations of the Compliance Committee and the
feedback received from Parties; and
10.Further requests the
Executive Secretary to submit the revised format, adjusted in
accordance with paragraph 8 of decision BS V/14, to the seventh
meeting of the Parties to the Protocol for its consideration.
