On 12-14 October 2014, the Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity hosted a three day business and biodiversity forum in parallel with COP 12. Approximately 250 people participated in the various elements of the forum over the course of the three days. This included official representatives of Parties, businesses, associations, NGOs, academia and other stakeholder groups, and represented well over 30 countries. On day one, parallel events were organised to discuss the four key themes of COP 12; BioTrade, Sustainable Tourism, Commodity Production and the Global Partnership. On days two and three, discussion sessions focused on the issues and concerns surrounding the implementation of the aforementioned key themes.

• Agenda and Speakers List
• Report of the meeting
• The COP12 business engagement decision can be found here: (http://www.cbd.int/doc/decisions/cop-12/cop-12-dec-10-en.pdf).
  
  

Images from the Meeting

Day 1 (Oct. 12th, 2014)

Parallel Event 1: UNCTAD BioTrade Congress

Parallel Event 2: Workshop on Sustainable Tourism

Parallel Event 3: Global Commodity Impact Indicators for Biodiversity

• Welcoming Session - Ms. Amy Fraenkel, Mr. Jason Clay

• Impacts of Commodity Production on Biodiversity - Mr. Claude Fromageot, Ms. Sharon Brooks, Mr. Jeffrey Milder, Mr. Gabriel Huppe

Parallel Event 4: The Global Partnership

• Opening: The Status of the Partnership - Mr. David Steuerman

• Panel 1: Opportunities and Challenges for Initiatives and the Partnership - Mr. Naoya Furuta, Ms. Kristiina Niikkonen, Ms. Seema Arora, Mr. Ciprian Ionescu

• Panel 2: Outreach Models to Businesses and Other Stakeholders - Ms. Carolin Bossmeyer, Mr. Kiruben Naicker, Ms. R. M. Harshini de Silva

• Panel 3: Mainstreaming of Biodiversity by Business - Ms. Elisa Romano, Ms. Maria Luisa del Rio Mispireta, Mr. Jung Jun Park

• Panel 4: Expanding the Membership of the Partnership and Future Projects - Mr. Wang Xin, Mr. Eduard Muller, Mr. Rolando A. Inciong

• Concluding Remarks - Mr. Reg Melanson, Mr. David Steuerman

Day 2 (Oct. 13th, 2014)

Session 1: Other CBD Issues and Enabling Conditions

• Parallel Panel 1a: Access and Benefit Sharing - Mr. Eduardo Escobedo, Mr. Suhel Al-Janabi, Mr. Thiago Augusto Terada, Mr. Claude Fromageot

• Parallel Panel 1b: Resource Mobilisation - Ms. Claudia Ituarte, Mr. Seiji Kawazoe, Mr. Laurent Piermont, Mr. Frank Vorhies

Session 2: Mainstreaming and Assessment

• Introductory Panel - Mr. Jeffrey Milder, Ms. Violaine Berger, Mr. Jason Clay, Mr. Akira Ichikawa

Session 3: Capacity Building and Cooperationg

• Introductory Panel - Mr. Jose Koechlin, Mr. Yusuke Saraya, Ms. Annabelle Prin-Cojan, Mr. David Oswald

Day 3 (Oct. 14th, 2014)

Session 4: Reporting and Communication

• Introductory Panel - Mr. Pavan Sukhdev, Mr. Richard Spencer, Ms. Giulia Carbone, Mr. Richard Mattison