Mr. Olivier Rukundo
Concordia University, Grad. Economics

Olivier Rukundo, BA (North. Iowa), Grad. Economics (Concordia), is currently an Associate Fellow with the Centre for International Sustainable Development Law (CISDL). He has worked with the CISDL for the past three years, as a legal scholar and researcher with the biodiversity programme. With the CISDL's research on legal aspects of access and benefit sharing (ABS) of genetic resources, he hosted the CISDL junior legal researchers' workshop on new research priorities for the international regime on access and benefit sharing, and has conducted legal research as part of the CISDL international partnership on ABS issues with Peru, Kenya, Costa Rica and India, supported by the International Development Research Centre. With the CISDL's research on legal aspects of Biosafety, he has served as an author and researcher in the design and development of a new manual on Biosafety for Decision-Makers, which was presented at the CBD first meeting of the Parties to the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety; in the preparation of a new book, 'When Biosafety Becomes Binding: Legal Aspects of Implementation of the Cartagena Protocol', for Cambridge University Press; and in a scoping study of the implementation of the Cartagena Protocol in developing countries for Environment Canada. Olivier is fluent in English and French, and is a candidate for the B.C.L. and L.L.B degrees in Civil and Common Law at the McGill University Faculty of Law. His previous work experience is with the United Nations Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), where he focused on compliance issues in the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety and in the international regime on access and benefit sharing under the Convention on Biological Diversity. His broader legal research interests include international trade law, international environmental law and intellectual property law.