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Agricultural Biotechnologies
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The News items relate to applications of biotechnologies in food and agriculture in developing countries and their major focus is on the activities of FAO, other UN agencies/bodies and the 15 CGIAR research centres. The News items cover all food and agricultural sectors (crops, forestry, fisheries/aquaculture, livestock, agro-industry) and a wide range of biotechnologies (e.g. use of molecular markers, artificial insemination, triploidisation, biofertilisers, micropropagation, genomics, genetic modification etc.). New documents are included as News if they are freely available on the web and, for people who can't download them or who wish further information, an e-mail contact is also provided. The News service was launched in January 2002 and all News items posted since then (there were 800 in the first 9 years) are available here. The news and event items on this website are also disseminated through an e-mail newsletter called FAO-BiotechNews that is published in six different versions, one per language i.e. Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish. To subscribe, send a message to [email protected] indicating which e-mail addresses are to be subscribed and in which language they wish to receive the newsletter.
19/11/2007
The General Assembly of the United Nations (UN) opened its 62nd session on 18 September 2007 at the UN Headquarters in New York, United States. The wide range of agenda items for consideration includes item 54.f on `Sustainable development: Convention on Biological Diversity`, for which a report (nr. A/62/276) has been prepared summarising the ongoing work regarding the Convention, including its Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety. It also includes agenda item 56.b, entitled `Globalization and interdependence: Science and technology for development`, for which a report (nr. A/62/136) has been submitted by the Secretary-General that includes an update on UN system-wide collaboration on biotechnology-related activities. See reports related to these agenda items (in Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish), plus draft resolutions, at http://www.un.org/ga/second/62/documentation.shtml or contact [email protected] for more information.
18/11/2007
One of the decisions (BS-II/9) made at the 2nd meeting of the Conference of the Parties serving as the meeting of Parties to the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety (COP-MOP/2) included a request that the Executive Secretary would convene, prior to the 4th meeting, regional workshops on capacity-building and exchange of experiences on risk assessment and risk management of living modified organisms. In this context, an African regional workshop was held on 23-25 August 2007 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, hosted by the African Union Commission and funded by the Government of the Netherlands and its report is now available. Secondly, a Central and Eastern European regional workshop will be held on 26-28 November 2007 in Chisinau, Moldova, hosted by the Government of Moldova, with funding from the Government of Switzerland, and the meeting documents are available at http://www.cbd.int/doc/meeting.asp?mtg=RWCBCEE-01. Contact [email protected] for any further information.
17/11/2007
The World Bank has recently published "Agricultural biotechnology: Transgenics in agriculture and their implications for developing countries", by E. Pehu and C. Ragasa, a 38-page paper that synthesises peer-reviewed research results published within the past three years and a few earlier, ground-breaking papers that are central to economic debates on the subject. It has also published "Science, technology and skills", by P. Pardey and and co-authors, a 118-page report that looks at the changing context of agricultural research and development, including some discussion about biotechnology. Both were prepared as background papers for the World Development Report 2008, recently published by the World Bank. See http://go.worldbank.org/R1GDGYU5E0 and http://go.worldbank.org/WW4BTHM0D0 respectively or contact [email protected] for more information.
16/11/2007
In October 2006, the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), Yale University and leading science and technology publishers launched the Online Access to Research in the Environment (OARE) initiative. The second phase of this initiative has just been announced, so that eligible institutions in a total of 107 low-income countries can now have free or low cost access to over 1,300 environment related scientific journals (some of which cover applications of biotechnology in food and agriculture). See http://www.oaresciences.org (in English, French and Spanish) or contact [email protected] for more information.
15/11/2007
The 3rd meeting of the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) ad hoc Group on Biotechnology was held on 12-14 June 2007 in Paris, France. The ad hoc Group`s purpose is to address the scientific and technical aspects of biotechnology that impact on animal health. The meeting report (unofficial version) is now available. See the report (in Appendix III, pages 13-40, 1.1 MB) or contact [email protected] for more information.
14/11/2007
In order to provide World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) Delegates with updated information to scientifically support decision-making, two special issues of the OIE Scientific and Technical Review have been dedicated to animal vaccination. The issues, edited by P.-P. Pastoret, M. Lombard and A.A. Schudel, are designed to provide useful generic information rather than give detailed technical descriptions of specific diseases or vaccines. The papers are organised under the following main headings: development and production of vaccines (including e.g. a paper on genomics and vaccine development); why use vaccines?; the scientific and economic basis of vaccination; regulatory aspects; and socio-ethical aspects. All the papers from the first issue, 26 (1), are currently available on the web while those from the second issue, 26 (2), will be available shortly. See the issues or contact [email protected] for more information.
13/11/2007
As part of its Topical Reviews in Agricultural Biodiversity series, Bioversity International has just published "Complementary strategies for ex situ conservation of coffee (Coffea arabica L.) genetic resources. A case study in CATIE, Costa Rica", edited by F. Engelmann, M.E. Dulloo, C. Astorga, S. Dussert and F. Anthony. The aim of this 61-page publication, sub-divided into seven chapters, is to "illustrate how new technologies (molecular biology and cryopreservation) can be efficiently employed to complement more classical ones for characterizing and rationalizing an ex situ germplasm collection, and to improve its conservation status". See the publication (515 KB) or contact [email protected] for more information.
12/11/2007
As part of its IFPRI Discussion Papers series, the International Food Policy Research Institute has just published "Farmer preferences for milpa diversity and genetically modified maize in Mexico: A latent class approach" by E. Birol, E.R. Villalba, and M. Smale. The aim of this 31-page paper is to estimate Mexican farmers valuation of the most important components of agrobiodiversity found in the milpa system, and the option to cultivate GM maize in this system, using data collected from 420 farm households across three states of Mexico. (The Mexican milpa system refers to a complex combination of agronomic practices, crop associations and rotation sequences). See the paper (359 KB) or contact [email protected] for more information.
11/11/2007
As part of its IFPRI Discussion Papers series, the International Food Policy Research Institute has published "The economic impact and the distribution of benefits and risk from the adoption of insect resistant (Bt) cotton in West Africa" by J. Falck-Zepeda, D. Horna and M. Smale. The 58-page study estimates the potential impact of the deployment of insect resistant cotton in selected countries in West Africa using different scenarios. See the paper (587 KB) or contact [email protected] for more information.
10/11/2007
On 12-16 September 2007, the Annual Research Meeting of the Generation Challenge Programme was held in Benoni, South Africa. The meeting was organised around four main themes: exploiting allelic diversity; genomic resources and gene/pathway discovery; marker development and breeding applications; and support services and enabling delivery. For a report of the meeting, providing links to all the presentations and posters, see http://www.generationcp.org/arm.php or contact [email protected] for more information.
09/11/2007
In accordance with Article 33 of the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety, each Party is required to monitor the implementation of its obligations under the Protocol and to report to the Conference of the Parties serving as the meeting of the Parties to the Protocol (COP-MOP) on measures taken to implement the Protocol. In this respect, First Regular National Reports have now been submitted by Parties and are available at http://www.cbd.int/reports/list.shtml?type=cpb1. Contact [email protected] if requiring more information.
08/11/2007
The World Development Report 2008 has just been published by the World Bank, entitled `Agriculture for development`. The report is split into three main parts: what can agriculture do for development? (part I, chapters 1-3); what are effective instruments in using agriculture for development? (part II, chapters 4-9); and how can agriculture-for-development agendas best be implemented? (part III, chapters 10-11). Chapter 7 is dedicated to ` Innovating through science and technology` and considers also the role of agricultural biotechnologies. See the full report at http://go.worldbank.org/LBJZD6HWZ0 (in English, with overviews in Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Portuguese, Russian and Spanish) or contact [email protected] for more information. The World Development Report is produced on an annual basis, this being its 30th year, and is the World Bank`s major analytical publication. The last one focusing on agriculture was in 1982 (entitled `Agriculture and economic development`).
07/11/2007
The UNEP-GEF global Project on Development of National Biosafety Frameworks (NBFs) began in June 2001. A total of 92 countries have now finished the project and have published draft NBFs on the web. See http://www.unep.ch/biosafety/news.htm#nbf or contact [email protected] for more information.
06/11/2007
On 2-3 May 2007, the World Intellectual Property Organization organised, in cooperation with the Industrial Property Office of the Slovak Republic, an international seminar on "Current challenges in intellectual property rights and biotechnology" in Banska Bystrica, Slovakia. Presentations from the seminar are now available on the web. See http://www.wipo.int/meetings/en/2007/ipr_bsk/ or contact [email protected] for more information.
05/11/2007
On 20-23 November 2007, the World Health Organization (WHO) is organising an intergovernmental meeting on "Pandemic influenza preparedness: Sharing of influenza viruses and access to vaccines and other benefits" in Geneva, Switzerland. At the meeting, the WHO Director-General will submit a report on `Patent issues related to influenza viruses and their genes` (item 2.2 on the provisional agenda). A background paper to this report is already available on the web, commissioned by WHO from the World Intellectual Property Organization. This 41-page working paper reviews certain technical patent issues relating to influenza viruses and their genes, with a particular focus on the avian flu or H5N1 subtype. See http://www.who.int/gb/pip/ or contact [email protected] for more information or to provide comments.
04/11/2007
Issue number 18 (September 2007) of the OECD Biotechnology Update is now available. Presented by OECD`s Internal Co-ordination Group for Biotechnology, the 24-page newsletter provides updated information on the diverse activities at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development related to biotechnology. It contains items on news, recent and future events, recent and future publications and provides web and e-mail contacts for the different areas of activity. See http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/3/44/39314743.pdf (389 KB) or contact [email protected] for more information.
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