Researchers tasked to collaborate to address challenges

Accra, Aug. 23, GNA - Dr Edward Omane Boamah, Deputy Minister of Environment, Science and Technology (MEST) has appealed to research institutions to collaborate to address environmental challenges. He said when researchers agreed to collaborate and share ideas on their research findings to collectively seek the way forward, the challenges facing the environment, especially in biotechnology, would be addressed to reduce poverty, hunger and disease. Dr Boamah made the appeal at a Biotechnology Awareness Creation Workshop in Accra on Tuesday.

It was aimed at updating information on the current status of agricultural biotechnology and bio-safety in the sub-region, including the establishment of a database of human resources, laboratory infrastructure, research and development and technology transfer activities.

In addition, it was to educate policy makers and the general public on biotechnology and biosafety issues as part of the SABIMA project, and passage of the Biosafety Bill into Law, now awaiting Presidential accent. SABIMA, an acronym for Strengthen Africa's Capacity for Safe Management of Biotechnology in Sub-Saharan Africa, is being implemented in six countries, namely Ghana, Burkina-Faso, Nigeria, Kenya, Uganda and Malawi.

The Centre for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) organised the workshop with support from NEPAD Agency and the Forum for Agriculture Research in Africa (FARA) on the theme: 93Strengthening Capacity for Safe Biotechnology Management in Sub-Saharan Africa".

Dr Boamah said biotechnology could help address poverty, hunger and disease and stressed the need for scientists to adopt measures and research into plants that were drought resistant to help avoid problems confronting people in the Horn of Africa.

He said the immense potential of biotechnology in solving many of the world's food and medical needs could not be overemphasized, saying "When we look at the enormous death toll at the horn of Africa at this moment one stops to think what plants developed for drought resistance could have done for the countries involved".

Dr Boamah said the controversy surrounding biotechnological developments and applications in the country had led to the development of international treaties and protocols on biosafety to provide regulatory framework to ensure environmentally safe applications of modern biotechnology in medicine, agriculture, and the environment in a sustainable manner and avoid endangering public health.

He said genetic engineering and other forms of biotechnology emerging from DNA techniques discovered in the 1970s had been praised as strategic technologies for the 21st Century, along with nuclear power and information technology as a result of research and development efforts of governments, policymakers and investors. Dr Boamah gave assurance of Government's determination to pass the Biosafety Law and advised researchers to continue to advance the various positive arguments on the need for the law to influence policy makers' attention to the bill.

Dr Hans Adu-Dapaah, Director of Crop Research Institute of CSIR said biotechnology had been identified as one of the leading technologies of the 21st Century, which had the potential to address economic, social and environment issues afflicting the poor in developing African countries.

He said biotechnology involved technological applications that used biological systems, living organisms, or their derivatives, to make or modify products and processes that gave far-reaching implications on biotechnology.

Dr Adu-Dapaah said agricultural biotechnology was a key tool on the development of new crops and promises to deliver stepwise changes in input and quality traits, which were generally accepted that genetically modified crops were the many strategies needed to feed, clothe and fuel nine billion people estimated to be living by the year 2050.

He said biotechnology also had the potential to guarantee the world's food supply, promote sustainable agriculture, alleviate hunger and malnutrition, ensure more efficient disposal of toxic waste and prevent pollution by treating waste products before they were released into the environment. 23 Aug. 11