When world leaders practically piled up for a United Nations convention on biodiversity last month in the Chinese city of Kunming, a country obviously absent from the event.
While the first component of the 15th United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity, or COP 15, remained without U. S. representation, the country has not been so reluctant.
In the 1980s, the United States was particularly involved in drafting one of the highest multilateral treaties on biodiversity conservation, yet 3 decades later, it remains the only UN member country that has yet to ratify the agreement, fearing it could harm biodiversity. sovereign interests of the United States.
Some 195 countries and the European Union have signed the pact. China is a signatory to the treaty on June 11, 1992 and ratified it on January 1, 1993, becoming one of the first countries to accede to it after the agreement was opened for signature at the Earth Summit in Brazil in 1992.
The Treaty, which entered into force on 29 December 1993, requires the conservation of biological diversity, the sustainable use of its parts and the fair and equitable sharing of those derived from the use of genetic resources.
As a non-member, the United States has sent a delegation of “observers” to each and every convention since the first COP in 1994, but officially it has had no say in decision-making and has not gone to vote.
Experts said the country is very concerned about the treaty’s drafting and negotiation procedure.
Domestic reflux
But because of the national resistance of some Republican senators and pharmaceutical giants, the then Americans. President George H. W. Bush never signed the treaty.
Biopharmaceutical industry leaders feared the U. S. would have to share its high-end assets, similar to genetic studies, with others. Industry leaders were also looking to retain resources from the next countries.
In an article for Golden Gate University Law Review, environmental lawyer Robert Blomquist cited a speech delivered by U. S. Senator Don Nickles of Oklahoma to the Senate in June 1992.
“The Biodiversity Treaty would necessarily force the movement of generation from the United States and other evolved countries to emerging countries,” Nickles said. An article of the treaty “would require the United States to move not only commercially to have technological products, but also the generation itself to emerging countries, regardless of the economic rights of intellectuals. “
Blomquist also recalled that corporate teams had sent letters to Bush opposing the signing of the Convention on Biological Diversity by the United States.
Under the treaty, biotech corporations in the United States would have to compensate house nations for their genetic clothing to create treatments.
Two and a half decades later, no president has sought ratification of the treaty.
Sarah Saunders, a researcher at the National Audubon Society, and Mariah Meek, an assistant professor at Michigan State University, co-authors of an op-ed on The Hill news on Jan. 8, suggested U. S. President Joe Biden paint with the Senate. immediately ratify the Convention.
“Global biodiversity policy is at a very important crossroads and the United States will have to come to the table before it’s too late,” they said.