Cancún, 12 Dec (Lim Li Ching*) – As the meetings of the United Nations Biodiversity Conference in Cancún reached their halfway mark, the issue of the continued work on risk assessment under the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety remained threatened.

The Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety, which is a Protocol to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), is the only international treaty that specifically regulates genetic engineering and genetically modified organisms (GMOs) or living modified organisms (LMOs), as they are known in the Protocol. Meetings of Parties to the CBD and the Cartagena Protocol are taking place in Cancun from 4 to 17 December.

Risk assessment is the central pillar of the Protocol, necessary to assess the effects of LMOs on the conservation and sustainable use of biological diversity, taking also into account risks to human health.