Press Release: Landmark decisions at biodiversity conference are a big step forward in protecting global biodiversity

191 countries agreed on 30 May, 2008, to take far reaching action in order to address the current unprecedented loss of biodiversity across the globe. At the 9th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity, which has been meeting for the past two weeks in Bonn Germany, consensus was reached on decisions, which will pave the way to ensuring that the increasing production of biofuels is sustainable and to finalising an international regime on access and benefit-sharing of genetic resources. These decisions will also lead to protecting vulnerable biodiversity in the high seas and to ensuring that concerns relating to biodiversity and forests are taken up in the ongoing climate change negotiations. As a result of today's agreement, governments will take concrete actions towards reaching the global target of significantly reducing the current rate of biodiversity loss by 2010.