www.checkbiotech.org ; www.raupp.info ; www.czu.cz

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, January 2007.

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.

[allafrica.com]