Ad Hoc Open-ended Informal Working Group to study issues relating to the conservation and sustainable use of marine biological diversity of areas beyond national jurisdiction

Co-chairs,
For several years now the General Assembly has been addressing, through this Working Group, the question of the conservation and sustainable use of marine biodiversity of areas beyong national jurisdiction, in accordance with its major role on the issue.
I would like at the outset to make a precision. The mandate of this Group refers to the biodiversity of “areas beyond national jurisdiction”. Such ambiguous expression refers to two maritime areas which nature and legal regime are different: the high seas and the Area. The Area and its resources, in accordance with Resolution 2749 (XXV) and Part XI of UNCLOS are the common heritage of mankind, the exploitation of which has to benefit mankind as a whole. This, co-chairs, must be the guiding principle.
Therefore, genetic resources of areas beyond national jurisdiction cannot be subject to unilateral access and use. Therefore, we will have to address the sharing of benefits, and consequently intellectual property aspects, up to now only ocasionally addressed by this Working Group.
Also, conservation is a remarkably important element, as well as capacity-building and the transfer of marine technology, as provided for in UNCLOS.
Co-chairs,
The Fourth meeting of this Working Group, in 2011, represented a significant progress in our work. Following the recommendations of the Group, the General Assembly decided to initiate a process “with a view to ensuring that the legal framework for the conservation and sustainable use of marine biodiversity in areas beyond national jurisdiction effectively addresses those issues by identifying gaps and ways forward, including through the implementation of existing instruments and the possible development of a multilateral agreement under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea”(*).

To put in place the process that at this Working Group starts today, the General Assembly, through its resolution 66/231, decided to amend the mandate of the Group. Therefore, this is the first meeting of the process that is to address “the conservation and sustainable use of marine
biodiversity in areas beyond national jurisdiction, in particular, together and as a whole, marine genetic resources, including questions on the sharing of benefits, measures such as area-based management tools, including marine protected areas, and environmental impact assessments, capacity-building and the transfer of marine technology”(*2).

Resolution 66/231 makes reference to “existing instruments”. Argentina wishes to underline that the applicable existing instrument is the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. The Convention does not provide a specific legal regime, but it does provide the applicable principles. Therefore, a crucial element of the process is the drawing up of an instrument that develops the principles of UNCLOS into concrete norms for the conservation and sustainable use of marine biodiversity of areas beyond national jurisdiction: an implementing agreement of UNCLOS.
Such agreement is to be negotiated as a “package” comprising conservation and sustainable use of marine biodiversity of areas beyond national jurisdiction, including genetic resources, the sharing of benefits, marine scientific research, capacity-building, and the transfer of marine technology.
Co-chairs,
Argentina is fully committed to the work of the Working Group so that under its new mandate it makes progress in all aspects of the future legal regime, which are to be addressed together and as a whole.
Regarding workshops, my delegations understands they have to be limited in number, and provide a more in depth analysis of the technical aspects of the issue. As workshops should promote the deep examination of certain aspects, their objective is to feed the work of the Working Group. Therefore, the dynamics we foresee consists in the examination of issues within the Working Group, and following the identification of the need to deepen the knowledge on some aspects, include those aspects in the workshop. Such deeper knowledge should in turn feed the following meeting of the Ad Hoc Working Group.
Co-chairs,
For several years, and emphatically in 2011, my delegation indicated that the status quo is not a sustainable option.
Thus, rest assured of the will of my delegation to work actively and constructively with a view to making this process advance towards its ultimate goal: an implementing agreement of UNCLOS.
Thank you.