John Kasozi
11 November 2009
Kampala — Uganda allocates only 3% of its Gross Domestic Product to agriculture.
This is less than 10% of what was agreed upon in 2003 at the Maputo Declaration in Mozambique, Makerere University Faculty of Agriculture's Prof. Patrick Rubaihayo said.
Rubaihayo was speaking at the 13th open forum on agro-biotechnology in Africa at the Shanghai Restaurant in Kampala last Friday.
The Maputo Declaration was the outcome of a conference of ministers of agriculture of the African Union.
The declaration acknowledged the urgency of implementing a comprehensive Africa agriculture development programme.
The ministers were concerned that 30% of the African population was chronically undernourished.
The continent has become an importer of food and it is the largest recipient of food aid in the world, the ministers said.
Rubaihayo, a professor of plant breeding and genetics, noted that Malawi, one of the signatories of the declaration, allocates 10% of its budget to agriculture.
"Within a year, Malawi changed from a food importing to exporting country. There are maize fields every where."
"The National Biotechnology Safety Bill, a legal instrument for the national biotechnology and bio-safety policy that was approved by the Government in 2008, has not been passed," Rubaihayo said. Kenya passed a Bill last year, he added.
The Bill contains regulations on the import, export, transit and the contained and confined use of genetically modified organisms.
It also handles the release and placing on the market of the organism, he said.
A number of biotechnology research activities are ongoing in the country under the interim regulatory provisions of the Uganda National Council of Science and Technology Act, Rubaihayo added.
"The Bill should be enacted into law sooner than later to deliver safe biotechnology products to the farmers," he said.
Biotechnology has created crops that are resistant to pests, drought and disease and with enhanced nutrition values.
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