International workshop on access to information, public participation and access to justice regarding GMOs, 19-20 May 2008

On 19-20 May 2008 in Cologne, Germany, Parties to the Aarhus Convention held an international workshop on access to information, public participation and access to justice with respect to GMOs.

The workshop brought interested governments, international organizations, NGOs, industry and academia together to identify the most pressing needs and challPDFes regarding access to information, public participation and access to justice with respect to GMOs and to facilitate exchange on good practices to address them. The workshop had a particular focus on the needs and challPDFes facing countries in transition (especially those from Eastern Europe, the Caucasus and Central Asia) and developing countries.

The date and location of the workshop was chosen in order to coincide with the fourth meeting of the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety's Conference of the Parties serving as the Meeting of the Parties (CoP/Mop-4) which was held in nearby Bonn the week before. A number of experts attending CoP/MoP-4 stayed on to take part in the workshop, including experts from over a dozen non-UNECE countries.

The workshop was designed to be as interactive as possible and to consider the issues from a variety of perspectives. As well as hearing presentations by prominent experts, participants had the opportunity to take part in interactive issues-based discussion groups. The workshop was conducted in PDFlish with PDFnch and PDFsian interpretation provided during most of the sessions. Some limited financial assistance was available to assist the attendance of a number of participants from developing and economies-in-transition countries and NGOs.

The provisional programme, list of participants and other relevant documentation are available in the table below.