MEL PRIVACY POLICY

Monitoring, Evaluation & Learning (MEL) respects your privacy and is committed to protecting your personal data. This privacy policy will inform you as to how we look after your personal data and tell you about your privacy rights and how the law protects you. This policy sets out:

·       Information we collect about you;

·       Information we collect about your affiliations;

·       Information we collect about your peers, partners, mentors and trainees;

·       Information we collect about your products, creations, innovations and publications, authentical, cloned or derived;

Please read the following carefully to understand our views and practices regarding your personal data and how we will treat it. For the purposes of the European Economic Area (EEA) and UK data protection law, the data controllers are the International Center for Agricultural Research in Dry Areas (ICARDA) and the International Potato Center (CIP), as joint controllers of Monitoring, Evaluation & Learning, from hereafter the “Controller”.

-        International Center for Agricultural Research in Dry Areas – ICARDA

Dalia Building 2nd Floor, Bashir El Kassar Street, Verdun, Beirut, Lebanon 1108-2010

Tel: +961 1 813303

Fax: +961 1 804071/01-843473

 

-        International Potato Center – CIP

Avenida La Molina 1895, La Molina, Apartado Postal 1558, Lima, Peru

Tel: +511 3496017

This policy covers the personal data collected through our website hosted at https://mel.cgiar.org. The website is operated by the Controller trading as “MEL Administration”.

We keep our privacy policy under regular review. This version was last updated on 23^rd January 2020.

Information we collect about you

Personal data, or personal information, means any information about an individual from which that person can be identified. It does not include data where the identity has been removed (anonymous data).

 

We may collect, use, store and transfer different kinds of personal data about you which we have grouped together as follows:

 

·       Information you give us:

-        Account and credentials information;

-        Professional information and affiliations;

-        Products, creations, innovations and publications;

-        Participation to events and activities;

-        Your communications within and through MEL and its components.

-        Your communications with the MEL Administration.

-        Uploads or posts.

 

·       Information we collect about you through our website for non-profit, internationally regulated research and development purposes:

-        Professional information and affiliations;

-        Products, creations, innovations and publications;

-        Participation to events and activities;

 

·       Information we receive from other sources (including Google) as part of internationally regulated agreements:

-        Professional information and affiliations;

-        Products, creations, innovations and publications;

-        Participation to events and activities;

-        Uploads or posts.

The Controller is responsible for keeping the data Open Access or Limited Access in accordance with the data owner’s wish, unless when legitimate ground for publication of the data is available or the data access status is regulated by law or is law enforced.

How we use your information

We use information held about you and other users for non-profit, of public interest, transparent service of Monitoring & Evaluation in accordance with the requests of worldwide donors and stakeholders, and that is strictly related to agricultural research projects and activities.

In particular, we retain the information for the scopes at point a, of the article 17, paragraph 3, of the Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European parliament and of the Council “General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)” of 27^th April 2016: “archiving purposes in the public interest, scientific or historical research purposes or statistical purposes”.

Third-party marketing

We will get your express opt-in consent before we share your personal data with any third party for marketing purposes.

Opting out

You can ask us or third parties to stop sending you unnecessary notifications at any time by logging into the website and checking or unchecking relevant boxes to adjust your notifications preferences.

 

Where you opt out of receiving unnecessary notifications, this will not apply to any data collected deemed necessary for the fulfilment of MEL obligations and activities, on the ground of points a, b, d of the article 17, paragraph 3, of the Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European parliament and of the Council “General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)” of 27^th April 2016.

 

Cookies

 

You can set your browser to refuse all or some browser cookies, or to alert you when websites set or access cookies. If you disable or refuse cookies, please note that some parts of this website may become inaccessible or not function properly. We use cookies for a variety of reasons detailed below:

 

·       Account related cookies:

By using a MEL account, we will use cookies for the management of the signup process and general administration. These cookies will usually be deleted when you log out however in some cases, they may remain afterwards to remember your site preferences when logged out.

 

·       Login related cookies:

We use cookies when you are logged in so that we can remember this fact. This prevents you from having to log in every single time you visit a new page. These cookies are typically removed or cleared when you log out to ensure that you can only access restricted features and areas when logged in.

 

·       Email newsletters related cookies:

This site offers newsletter or email subscription services and cookies may be used to remember if you are already registered and whether to show certain notifications which might only be valid to subscribed/unsubscribed users.

 

·       Surveys related cookies:

From time to time we offer user surveys and questionnaires to provide you with interesting insights, helpful tools, or to understand our user base more accurately. These surveys may use cookies to remember who has already taken part in a survey or to provide you with accurate results after you change pages.

 

·       Forms related cookies:

When you submit data to through a form such as those found on contact pages or comment forms cookies may be set to remember your user details for future correspondence.

 

·       Site preferences cookies:

In order to provide you with a great experience on this site we provide the functionality to set your preferences for how this site runs when you use it. In order to remember your preferences, we need to set cookies so that this information can be called whenever you interact with a page is affected by your preferences.

 

In some special cases we also use cookies provided by trusted third parties. The following section details which third party cookies you might encounter through this site.

 

·       This site uses Google Analytics. These cookies may track things such as how long you spend on the site and the pages that you visit so we can continue to produce engaging content.

 

·       Third party analytics are used to track and measure usage of this site so that we can continue to produce engaging content. These cookies may track things such as how long you spend on the site or pages you visit which helps us to understand how we can improve the site for you.

 

·       From time to time we test new features and make subtle changes to the way that the site is delivered. When we are still testing new features, these cookies may be used to ensure that you receive a consistent experience whilst on the site whilst ensuring we understand which optimisations our users appreciate the most.

 

·     We employ several web services designed to improve the user experience and expand MEL capabilities. For these to work, the web services will set cookies through our site which may be used to enhance your profile on their site or contribute to the data they hold for various purposes outlined in their respective privacy policies.

 

·     We use social media buttons and/or plugins on this site that allow you to connect with your social network in various ways. For these to work, the social media sites, including Twitter and YouTube, will set cookies through our site which may be used to enhance your profile on their site or contribute to the data they hold for various purposes outlined in their respective privacy policies.

Change of purpose

 

We will only use your personal data for the purposes for which we collected it, unless we reasonably consider that we need to use it for another reason and that reason is compatible with the original purpose. If you wish to get an explanation as to how the processing for the new purpose is compatible with the original purpose, please contact us.

 

If we need to use your personal data for an unrelated purpose, we will notify you and we will explain the legal basis which allows us to do so.

 

Please note that we may process your personal data without your knowledge or consent, in compliance with the above rules, where this is required or permitted by law.

 

Who we give your (and of other users) personal data to

We may share your data with:

·       Any partner and member of our consortium, which includes centers and research programs;

·       Our trusted suppliers, e.g. service providers, consultancy firms.

We may disclose your personal data to third parties:

·       Where we are under a duty to disclose or share your personal data in order to comply with a legal obligation, enforce our terms, protect the rights, property or safety of Controller, our customers or others. This includes exchanging information for fraud prevent and to prevent cybercrime.

Where we store your (and of other users) personal data

The data we collect from you may be transferred to, and stored at, a destination outside of the EEA that may not be subject to equivalent UK and EEA data protection law. The data is accessible in any country of the world.

 

Where your information is transferred outside of the EEA, we will take all steps reasonably necessary to ensure that your data is subject to appropriate safeguards, such as relying on a recognised legal adequacy mechanism, and that it is treated securely and in accordance with this privacy policy.

 

How we protect your information

 

We have put in place appropriate security measures to prevent your personal data from being accidentally lost, used or accessed in an unauthorised way, altered or disclosed. In addition, we limit access to your personal data to those employees, agents, contractors and other third parties who have a business need to know. They will only process your personal data on our instructions and they are subject to a duty of confidentiality.

 

We have put in place procedures to deal with any suspected personal data breach and will notify you and any applicable regulator of a breach where we are legally required to do so.

 

Our website may, from time to time, contain links to external sites. We are not responsible for the privacy policies or content of such sites.

 

How we protect your personal data

 

We will only retain your personal data for as long as reasonably necessary to fulfil the purposes we collected it for, including for the purposes of satisfying any legal, regulatory, tax, accounting or reporting requirements. We may retain your personal data for a longer period in the event of a complaint or if we reasonably believe there is a prospect of litigation in respect to our relationship with you.

 

To determine the appropriate retention period for personal data, we consider the amount, nature and sensitivity of the personal data, the potential risk of harm from unauthorised use or disclosure of your personal data, the purposes for which we process your personal data and whether we can achieve those purposes through other means, and the applicable legal, regulatory, tax, accounting or other requirements.

 

Your rights

 

You have the following rights:

 

·       To be provided with a copy of your personal data held by us;

·       To request the rectification or erasure of your personal data held by us;

·       To request that we restrict the processing of your personal data (while we verify or investigate your concerns, for example);

·       To object to the further processing of your personal data, including the right to object to marketing (see opting out section above);

·       To request that your provided personal data be moved to a third party;

·       Where the processing of your personal data is based on consent, you have the right to withdraw consent by contacting us (see contact us section).

 

You can exercise these rights at any time by [contacting us using the details below.]

 

How you can contact us

 

If you have any questions about this privacy policy or our privacy practices, please contact us in the following ways:

 

-        International Center for Agricultural Research in Dry Areas – ICARDA

Dalia Building 2nd Floor, Bashir El Kassar Street, Verdun, Beirut, Lebanon 1108-2010

Tel: +961 1 813303

Fax: +961 1 804071/01-843473

 

-        International Potato Center – CIP

Avenida La Molina 1895, La Molina, Apartado Postal 1558, Lima, Peru

Tel: +511 3496017

 

You have the right to make a complaint at any time with a supervisory authority in the Member State of your habitual residence, place of work or of an alleged infringement of the General Data Protection Regulation. In the UK, the supervisory authority is the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO)(www.ico.org.uk). We would, however, appreciate the chance to deal with your concerns before you approach the ICO so please contact us in the first instance.

 

 

Last edit on 2 October 2018.