Bridges Trade BioRes • Volume 7 • Number 7 • 13th April 2007

West Africa Biotech Meeting Adopts Action Plan

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Agriculture, environment, science and technology ministers participating in an Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) biotechnology conference recently adopted a plan to boost biotechnology cooperation in the region. Meanwhile, civil society representatives — concerned that industry was driving the agenda — held their own counter-summit.

Around 200 experts and politicians from the fifteen ECOWAS countries* met in Accra, Ghana, from 28-30 March to discuss agricultural biotechnology. At the end of the meeting they adopted a regional action plan for biotechnology and biosafety development for 2006-2010. In addition to promoting cooperation and integration of research efforts, the plan outlines strategies for increasing investment into biotechnology, including through private-public partnerships. It also stresses the need to adopt biosafety measures at both the national and regional level, and establishes a network of public information centres for biotechnology.

Participants expressed different opinions and expectations. Baboucarr Manneh of the Africa Rice Center in Benin was hopeful that biotechnology would help improve agricultural productivity in West Africa, pointing to the need for crops resistant to environmental stresses, and for disease-free and nutritionally-enhanced crops. Harold Roy-Macauley of the World Agroforestry Center said it was time that the ECOWAS region embraced biotechnology. He said “biotechnology, this technology, could be used. It is not a panacea, but it contributes to improving food security. It could contribute to improving productivity.”

Environmentalists, scientists, farmers and consumer groups gathering at their own counter-summit remained critical, however, and called for more research and critical assessment of biotechnology, and for the establishment of GM-free zones. Entitled “Checking the GMO Policy Thrust in ECOWAS,” the conference adopted a resolution that stressed that the GM debate should include wider issues such as food sovereignty, good governance and democracy. According to the activists, governments should not succumb to the biotech industry lobby — they should reject the privatisation of the food chain and focus on the development of local food systems.

* Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Côte d’Ivoire, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone and Togo belong to ECOWAS.

“ECOWAS Biotechnology Ministerial Summit Begins In Accra,” GHANA BROADCASTING COPRPORATION, 28 March 2007; “West Africa to boost food crops with biotechnology,” SCIDEV.NET, 4 April 2007; “West Africa: Civil Society Rejects ECOWAS Plan for Biotech,” LAGOS THIS DAY, 9 April 2007; “Improve Agricultural Productivity And Competitivity In Ecowas Through Biotechnology,” ECOWAS RELEASE, 29 March 2007.