On 24 February 2025, a meeting of Working Party F.5 on genetic resources and innovation in agriculture (gene resources) was held in Brussels, Belgium, hosted by the Polish delegation under the Presidency of the European Union.
The purpose of the first meeting of the Working Party was to prepare positions within the European Union Member States for the 20th Regular Session of the FAO Commission on Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture to be held on 24–28 March 2025 in Rome.
The meeting covered the thematic areas:
– access and benefit sharing (ABS),
– biodiversity for food and agriculture,
– aquaculture genetic resources for food and agriculture,
– animal genetic resources for food and agriculture,
– micro-organisms and invertebrates for food and agriculture,
– plant genetic resources for food and agriculture,
– forest gene resources.
The Polish delegation consisted of representatives and experts from the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, the Plant Breeding and Acclimatization Institute – National Research Institute, the State Forests – Kostrzyca Forest Gene Bank, the National Research Institute of Animal Production and the Permanent Representative of Poland to the European Union.
On behalf of the National Research Institute of Animal Production, Poland was represented by Ewa Sosin, PhD Eng. – National Coordinator for Animal Genetic Resources, Agnieszka Chełmińska, PhD Eng. – Head of the Department of Farm Animal Biodiversity Conservation and Horse Breeding, and Grażyna Polak, PhD Eng. – National Focal Point for Biodiversity.
The essential part of the meeting was the presentation of the Presidency program and information by PREZ on the implementation of the tasks of genetic resources conservation in Poland in the sectors of plant, animal, forest, aquaculture gene resources conservation and the work plan of the working party in the Council, as well as the presentation of the activities of various working parties in international forums.
The annex is in English – The Presidency Program – Brussels