BuaNews (Tshwane)
29 January 2007
The co-ordinator of the West and Central Africa Programme for Bio-safety Systems (PBS) has urged African leaders to support the development of modern biotechnology, including genetically modified (GM) crops.
Professor Walter Sandow Alhassan, a former director-general of the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), made the call here today, following the publication of "The 2006 Global Status of Commercialised Biotech/GM crops."
This is a publication by the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications (ISAAA), a non-profit organisation committed to alleviating hunger and poverty by sharing crop biotechnology applications with subsistence farmers in developing countries.
Prof Alhassan said African leaders must invest in the training of scientists and provide the needed infrastructure to enable them to make meaningful contribution to the economic development of Africa.
Biotechnology, Prof Alhassan said, needed to attract investment from within Africa and should not rely solely on donor assistance.
He noted that the current biotechnology products that were developed or used in West Africa depended on the status of each country's bio-safety legislation.
He said Nigeria was the only West African country with a developed biotechnology policy and was almost at the completion stage of its bio-safety policy, while Ghana's bio-safety draft law was currently at Cabinet level, adding that "hopefully we would complete the development of the biotechnology policy this year".
Prof Alhassan, who is also a Biotechnology Policy Adviser, said although African governments were showing some political will through pronouncements such as building the needed capacity in biotechnology, "it was time the rhetoric was matched with needed resources beginning from the in-country level to develop the needed capacity for the development and safe use of the product of modern biotechnology".
He observed that the negative mindset surrounding GM crops was rather unfortunate and identified a need for more education on the benefits of using biotechnology in food production.
Elizabeth Parkes of the CSIR Crop Research Institute (CRI) explained that Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO) were products whose genetic make up had been modified by artificially moving a gene from one organism into another.
The process allows the movement of genes across the species barrier into species that were not related, she explained, citing an example of taking a gene from an animal to a plant or between unrelated plants.
"We need biotech because we need to match our food production needs with the increase in population," Ms Parkes said, as GMOs had the potential to improve upon currently available foods and medicines for the advancement of man.
The Global Status of Commercialized Biotech/GM Crops by the ISAAA is an annual publication that provides information and knowledge sharing service to the Global community, by compiling and sharing updates and progress made in areas of biotechnology.
In 2005, the Department of Agriculture confirmed that no moratorium was placed on the importation of genetically modified (GM) maize into South Africa.
The department then said all activities involving genetically modified organisms are regulated under the Genetically Modified Organisms Act, 1997 (Act No. 15 of 1997).
This included the importation of GM maize for use as food and feed. - BuaNews-NNN
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