18/01/2012

The International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture has launched a new website that offers a single one-stop-access point to plant genetic resources information by listing meeting documents, publications, projects, news, videos, funding information and technical support tools for national focal points, policy makers and other stakeholders involved in the national implementation of the Treaty.

The website was presented in Rome by Dr Shakeel Bhatti, Secretary of the International Treaty, during a briefing session to the Permanent representatives of the Contracting Parties.

Due to increasing amount of information and documents on plant genetic resources for food and agriculture produced under the Treaty, an innovative virtual library has been set up to allow easy access to meeting documents, training and communication materials in six languages. Thanks also to the agreements made during the latest months with institutions and individuals, a large amount of publications on the Treaty have been made available up to 800 on topics like access and benefit-sharing, conservation and sustainable use and farmers’ rights.

The new portal provides also easy and quick access to various types of notifications to Contracting Parties, International relevant organizations, National Focal Points, as well as news, articles, videos and information on the projects being implemented under the Benefit-sharing Fund of the international Treaty. 

But the new website has gone social too, providing better linkages to social media, which have seen an unprecedented success during the last few years. “These applications are increasingly used by organizations, institutions and companies to communicate and interact and now also the International Treaty community will be able to benefit from some of the major ones like Facebook”, said Dr Bhatti, Secretary of the International Treaty on PGRFA.