Laura van der Meer
Brussels Office Managing Partner Kelley Drye

Companies expend a great deal of resources to be informed about and positively influence national and local regulatory developments with potential business impacts. Less attention typically is paid to the processes under multilateral environment and trade agreements that create internationally-agreed policies and rules that must be incorporated into domestic law by the parties to these agreements. The international community will make decisions on several important emerging technologies that could affect the timely access to or even viability of certain innovations.

SYNTHETIC BIOLOGY

The Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) is a multilateral agreement aimed at the conservation and sustainable use of biological diversity and the fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising out of the utilization of genetic resources. Signed at the Rio Earth Summit in 1992, 196 countries are parties today. Since 2000, several important protocols to the CBD have been negotiated including the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety, which aims to contribute to the safe transfer and u ...