1. The Chairperson recalled that the Council had set in motion an information-gathering process on the matter of Article 27.3(b) at its meeting in December 1998. As a result, information as requested by the Council had been received from some 30 Members as well as from the FAO, UPOV and the Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity. At its meeting in February 1999, the Council had agreed that the Secretariat be asked to compile, in an informal note, the information received from Members in the form of a structured summary overview. This note had been circulated in informal document No. 2689 of 7 May 1999.
