Celebrating ten years of collaboration in the Secretariat of the Basel, Rotterdam and Stockholm Conventions.

The BRS Secretariat is ten years young today, yet it’s difficult to imagine a time when the missions of the Basel, Rotterdam and Stockholm Conventions were not intertwined. From the Basel Convention’s broad mandate to minimize the generation of hazardous and other wastes, ensure their environmentally sound management and control their transboundary movements, to the Rotterdam Convention providing countries with a first line of defence against unwanted imports of hazardous chemicals, and the Stockholm Convention’s work on prohibiting or restricting the production, use, international trade, release and storage of persistent organic pollutants, all three agreements share the common objective of protecting human health and the environment.

The BRS Secretariat is essentially a functional representation of the synergistic relationship that exists between the three Conventions. As Executive Secretary Rolph Payet puts it, “In more ways than one, we serve as the hazardous chemicals and wastes nexus, always working to further enhance international environmental governance and cooperation. I am proud to serve an entity that continues to be the flagship of efforts to improve international environmental governance.”

One of the principal functions of the BRS Secretariat is the preparation and management of the BRS Conference of the Parties (BRS COPs), the highest decision-making body under each Convention. Drawing on guidance provided by the Bureaux of the Conferences of the Parties, the Secretariat organises the BRS COPs on a biannual basis. This year will signal the first time that all Parties will have the opportunity to meet again in Geneva since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, marking what is described by Deputy Executive Secretary Carlos Martin-Novella as an auspicious occasion: “2022 is a milestone year for multilateral cooperation with respect to the environment. The United Nations Environment Programme is turning 50 years old, the international community is celebrating the 50^th anniversary of the Stockholm Conference on the Human Environment, and the BRS Secretariat is completing a decade of successful work.” The 2022 BRS COPs, which will be held from 7 to 16 June is Geneva, are a great opportunity for world leaders, experts and decisionmakers to meet face-to-face for the first time in the post-pandemic era and agree on new solutions to bring forward positive change in the environmental world.

Having been with the BRS Secretariat since day one, Senior Policy and Strategy Advisor Maria Cristina Cardenas has a well-rounded perspective about the ways the Secretariat’s work has been advancing cooperation on global environmental issues over the years. “Considering that the BRS Conventions are not only legally binding but also enjoy nearly universal coverage, decisions taken over these past ten years to address major issues like plastic waste management, toxic chemicals and biopesticides, all have a lasting and substantial effect on all of our lives and the planet”, she remarks.

Such environmental issues certainly don’t exist in a vacuum. The Secretariat provides a platform for their assessment, taking into account scientific as well as socioeconomic considerations, and thereby feeding into the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals and the Agenda 2030. With ten years down and hopefully many more to come, there’s definitely room for more ambition and further progress to be made ahead.

Disclaimer: The BRS 10th anniversary refers to the day when all the BRS Secretariats administered by the United Nations Environment Programme (the Basel Convention Secretariat, the Stockholm Convention Secretariat, and half of the Rotterdam Convention Secretariat) came under joint management on 18 February 2011.

The Executive Secretary and team whish you Season’s Greetings and Best Wishes for 2022.

The Basel Convention Implementation and Compliance Committee successfully completed its fourteenth meeting on 18 November 2021, bringing to the Conference of the Parties two guidance documents as well as a wide range of recommendations to improve the implementation of the Convention, in addition to having reviewed and assisted in resolving implementation and compliance difficulties faced by 19 Parties.

Over a series of online sessions convened between July 2020 and November 2021, the Committee tackled implementation and compliance issues with core obligations under the Convention, including the obligations to transmit national reports, to develop adequate legal frameworks, to prevent and combat illegal traffic and to control transboundary movements of hazardous wastes and other wastes. Building on its past practice the Committee also convened a dialogue session with 8 other multilateral environmental agreements with trade control provisions to learn from their experience in preventing and combating illegal trade/traffic in environmentally sensitive commodities.

“The Committee has continued to make strides by classifying compliance performance, strengthening its cooperation with other compliance committees, developing recommendations on how to integrate the implementation of the Convention into the broader United Nations sustainable development cooperation framework processes, and developing guidance documents on transit transboundary movements and on insurance, bond and guarantee. The breadth of its recommendations and outcomes provides the Conference of the Parties with a range of opportunities to improve the implementation of the Convention” said the Executive Secretary of the Convention Mr. Rolph Payet.

The outcomes of the Committee will be considered by the fifteenth meeting of the Conference of the Parties when it resumed its work through a face-to-face segment on 6-17 July 2022.

Expressing his satisfaction with the progress achieved, the Chair of the Committee, Mr. Florisvindo Furtado (Cabo Verde) said “The members of the Committee have showed remarkable commitment in these COVID-19 pandemic times and worked relentlessly to deliver on their mandate. The Committee has helped Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Sao Tome and Principe and Turkmenistan resolve their compliance difficulties, and is assisting 16 other Parties achieve the same. The Committee continues to have an excellent track record with regards to specific submissions thanks to the commitment of Parties towards the Convention”.

The work of the Committee benefits from generous financial support provided by Germany, Japan, Norway and Switzerland.