The conference on biodiversity (CBD), running from 10-21 May 2010, is currently taking place in Nairobi. As 2010 is also the UN “International Year of Biodiversity” there has been quite a lot of activity surrounding the meetings.  While most events in this vain fail to deliver tangible outcomes this particular CBD/SBSTTA 14  technical meeting is notable for some of its peripheral activities.  One observation is the increase in organised social media activity.  I particularly enjoy this blog entitled Undercover COP: dispatches from the CBD negotiations while the CBD Alliance is another good example.  This sort of ‘torrent’ approach to information management has proven to be an effective tool for accessing the inner workings of typically firewalled negotiations. Another observation is that the lexicon surrounding CBD issues is evolving quite quickly.  It could be that this is an effort by the larger lobbies to re-frame the debate, regardless, it seems a constructive approach, particularly in the pinning down of slippery or controversial issues.  I recently posted a report by the UK Food Group which is a good example of this sort of lexicon tetris. The UK Food Group has also made a collection of related CBD reports available to download here.

The CBD conference plan covers a vast terrain of issues; perhaps the mandate is even too broad, as each subsection is worthy content to be addressed alone. Topics range from:

• Mountain Biodiversity
• Biodiversity and Climate Change
• Inland Water Biodiversity
• Sustainable use of biodiversity and application of the Addis Ababa Principles and Guidelines
• Marine and Coastal Biodiversity
• Implementation of work on protected areas
• Forest Biodiversity
• Taxonomic needs assessments and identification of priorities
• Agricultural Biodiversity
• Global Biodiversity
• Biofuels and Biodiversity
• Global Strategy for Plant Conservation
• Biodiversity of Dry and Sub-humid lands
• Biodiversity Targets and Indicators
• gaps and inconsistencies in the International Regulatory Framework
• Incentive Measures - mitigation of perverse, and the promotion of positive

The official website for the CBD/SBSTTA 14 (a huge initialism for the Conference on Biodiversity/the 14th meeting of the Subsidiary Body on Scientific, Technical and Technological Advice. Perhaps the title is evidence enough that this conference should be separated into more manageable bits) is here.

A link the the official programme is here. (pdf)