Abstract
The eleventh Conference of the Parties (COP-11) to the CBD will be held in Hyderabad, India, on 8-19 October 2012. On the agenda for COP-11 are numerous items related to marine and coastal biodiversity as mandated in Decision X/29 from COP-10, stating that the executive secretary should organize a series of regional workshops to assist in the description of ecologically and biologically signicant marine areas based on the application of scientic criteria.