Archive for November, 2005

Ministry urges equal policies on GMOs

November 30, 2005
The Standard
By: Allan Kisia
The Ministry of Agriculture has called for the adoption of a harmonised policy on biotechnology for the eastern and southern Africa region.
Permanent Secretary James Ongwae said yesterday the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (Comesa) member states were at different levels in the enactment of biosafety bills.
He said some [...]

Zambia’s Position on GM Food Intriguing

The position of the Zambian government on genetically modified food has always statled me.They say this and do that with regard to GMOs. For starters, Zambia suffers perennial chronic food shortage mainly due to drought. This Southern African country still relies on outdated farming practices. It has not, yet,embraced modern farming technologies such as modern [...]

Food Security Could Become Reality

November 21, 2005
Mmegi Business Week
By: Bester Gabotlale
The drive towards achieving food security in Africa could become a reality, thanks to the bold initiatives by the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD) to get African countries to commit at least 10 percent of their annual budgets to the agricultural sector.
Professor Richard Mkandawire, an agriculture advisor [...]

Vatican’s Position on GMOs Long Overdue

Should the Vatican endorse genetically modified (GM) food? This question has been asked a million times by scientists, policy makers, farmers and the biotech industry. The never-ending pressure for the Vatican to declare its position on genetically modified food reinforces the notion that that religion and science are inseparable. Both are in symbiotic relationship – [...]

Burkina’s gene revolution promises high improvement in yield and sharp decrease in production cost

November 17,2005
Daily Observer
By: Karim Sonko
Many African countries are becoming more convinced about the potential of agricultural biotechnology, and are currently engaged in some aspect of research in particular areas of priority, and Burkina Faso is one of them.
Burkina Faso, the second biggest cotton producer in West Africa, has embraced agricultural aiotechnology and officially permits field [...]

GM crops ‘vital’ for Africa’s food supply

November 16, 2005
Cape Argus
By: John Yeld
Africa will have a projected cereal crop shortfall of 88.7 million tons by 2025, but the population will have doubled to 1.5 billion in the same period, a University of Cape Town biotechnologist has warned.
This was why biotechnical solutions involving genetic engineering to produce more and better crops were a [...]

Asian publications on GM plant science are soaring

November 15, 2005
SciDev.Net
By: Wagdy Sawahel
In 2003, Asia matched Western Europe and North America in the number of papers published on the genetic modification of plants, according to a report in the November issue of Nature Biotechnology.
By analysing publications from 1973-2003 in two major databases — the ISI Web of Science and CAB Abstracts — Philippe [...]

Ethiopian biotech institute planned

November 15, 2005
The Scientist in an Email.

The ABRI is part of the overall agricultural research capacity building project funded by a World Bank loan, and will be part of the Hotela Agricultural Research Center, about 45 kilometers from Addis Ababa. Its goal is to train African researchers, and supply them with resources for experiments. In [...]

U.S. Envoy Urges Vatican on Biotech Crops

November 12, 2005
Associated Press
By: Nicole Winfield
The new U.S. ambassador to the Holy See urged the Vatican on Saturday to promote the potential of biotech crops, saying there was a “moral imperative” to investigate the possible benefits of agricultural technology to feed the world’s hungry.
“Nothing on its own can solve the complex problem of world hunger,” [...]

A chance to Embrace Biotech Cotton

Suppose you are a millionaire farmer and a homeless person asks you, “What can I do to extricate myself from the yokes of poverty?” What would be your answer to this desolate person? Having made a fortune in farming, I rightly bet you will counsel him/her to get to farming.
For a long time, West [...]