Present there were officials of ministries and national institutions including the Ministry of Land and Environmental Conservation, the visiting delegation of the United Nations Environment Programme, members of the delegation of Tongji University in Shanghai of China, representatives of international organizations and staff members of foreign embassies here.

Kim Song Hak, vice-minister of Land and Environmental Conservation, and Henk Verbeek, head of the delegation of the United Nations Environment Programme, spoke at the meeting.

Speakers said that to observe the day is of weighty significance, recalling that the United Nations Environment Programme proposed setting "many biological species, a planet and future" as the theme of this year.

They stressed the need to make joint efforts to protect bio-diversity and raise its social awareness.

Then followed speeches.

The speakers referred to the cause for depleting the bio-diversity and ways of settling the problem, closer international cooperation in protecting it and the achievements made by the DPRK.