African biotechnology stakeholders asked to ensure sound scientific evidence
Pretoria, May 20, GNA - African biotechnology stakeholders have been called to ensure that approvals of Genetically Modified (GM) crops for food use were based on sound scientific evidence.
“We need to encourage objectivity and consistency decision making to ensure the safe introduction of future GM food products”, Dr Nompumelelo Obokoh, Executive Director of Africa Bio, said at the end of a 10-day Biosafety Internship and Study Tour for African regulators in Pretoria, South Africa.
It was organised for participants, primarily regulators and researchers, drawn from West Africa, East Africa and Southern Africa at various stages of the bio-safety regulatory process such as contained trials, confined field trials and commercialization of genetically modified crops.
The tour, organized by the NEPAD Agency, Africa Bio-safety Network of Expertise (ABNE) in collaboration with Africa-Bio, a non-profit organization serving as the voice for African bio-technology, gave participants the opportunity to share knowledge and experiences among themselves as they learned from the experiences of the South African Bio-safety System.
The tour has helped developed the capacity and expertise of participants in bio-technology and bio-safety regulations, its implementation and enforcement, to create an enabling environment for bio-technology to thrive in their respective countries.
The internship and study tour included workshop sessions that provided an overview of divergent and cross cutting issues related to the agricultural bio-technology applications, bio-safety regulation in South Africa, economic development potential for Africa's agriculture and food security as well as field and laboratory tours.
Dr Obokoh explained that though Africa was expected to move with the technological world, there was the need to get the required and appropriate regulations.
She noted that there were many developing countries that rarely got the minimum requirement of vitamins and as a result suffered from various health implications, citing lack of vitamin A, which caused blindness and lack of iron.
She said the application of modern bio-technology could address these health problems and added that “Scientists have discovered ways of adding vitamin A and more iron to rice to give the needed and required amount of these vitamins to protect us.”
Dr Obokoh noted that bio-technology was a new technology, which had been in use for centuries and with modern biotechnology, it will increase diseases and pest resistance, have more nutritious composition of foods with fewer allergens and allergenic compounds.
She asked Government regulators to ensure that food safety assessments were thoroughly carried out to allay the fears of citizens and also take the issue of communication seriously.
Dr Roshan Abdallah, Director of Technical Services, Tropical Pesticides Research Institute of Tanzania, commended the organizers of the programme for the knowledge impacted, and asked regulators not to hesitate to share ideas and experiences among themselves to ensure harmonization.
Mr Samuel Timpo, Senior Program Officer of the AU-NEPAD African Biosafety Network of Expertise, reiterated the need for Africa to build stronger linkages with national regulatory authorities and key stakeholders, to ensure successful regional harmonization of bio-safety regulations.
Participants were awarded certificates of participation and asked to put into practice knowledge acquired.
GNA