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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.
08/05/2004
The 27th FAO Regional Conference for Asia and the Pacific takes place on 17-21 May 2004 in Beijing, China. One of the information documents to be presented is entitled "Seed policy and regulations in the light of the International Treaty on PGRFA and the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety". It provides a brief overview of seed systems and also discusses the impact that the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture, the International Plant Protection Convention and the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety may have on national seed policies and regulations. See http://www.fao.org/Unfao/Bodies/RegConferences/aprc27/aprc27_en.htm (document APRC/04/INF/5, in Chinese, English and French) or contact FAO to request a copy.
07/05/2004
The 20th Session of the International Rice Commission (IRC) was held on 23-26 July 2002 in Bangkok, Thailand. Proceedings of the Session, held every four years, are now available on the web, entitled "Sustainable rice production for food security". A number of papers discussed the role of biotechnology. The IRC works within the framework of FAO and currently has 61 member countries. See http://www.fao.org/DOCREP/006/Y4751E/y4751e00.htm or contact FAO for more information.
06/05/2004
The 1st meeting of the Conference of the Parties serving as the Meeting of Parties to the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety (COP-MOP 1) took place on 23-27 February 2004 in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The 147-page report of the meeting is now available. See Document 23 (UNEP/CBD/BS/COP-MOP/1/15, in Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish) at http://www.biodiv.org/doc/meeting.aspx?mtg=MOP-01 or contact [email protected] for further information.
05/05/2004
The 7th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (COP 7) took place on 9-20 February 2004 in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The 91-page report, as well as the 317-page report annex containing the text of the decisions adopted, is now available (in Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish). See http://www.biodiv.org/doc/meeting.aspx?lg=0&mtg=cop-07 (Documents 39 and 40 i.e. UNEP/CBD/COP/7/21/PART1 and UNEP/CBD/COP/7/21/PART2 respectively) or contact [email protected] for further information.
04/05/2004
A series of six sub-regional workshops on "Development of a regulatory regime and administrative systems for national biosafety frameworks" is taking place under the UNEP-GEF Project on Development of National Biosafety Frameworks. Reports from the workshops on 25-28 November 2003 in Santiago, Chile (report in English and Spanish) and on 9-12 December 2003 in Antalya, Turkey (in English) are available at http://www.unep.ch/biosafety/devdocuments.htm#subregthird or contact [email protected] for more information.
03/05/2004
As a contribution to the UNCTAD-ICTSD (United Nations Conference on Trade and Development-International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development) Project on Intellectual Property Rights and Sustainable Development, a paper entitled "Nutrition and technology transfer policies" by J.H. Barton has just been published on the web. The 27-page paper describes nutrition and agricultural trends; technology transfer processes in nutrition and agriculture; analyses the key policy issues (including biosafety and biotechnology) in 4 situations (market or small-holder agriculture, with private or public sector technology transfer) and, finally, reviews the general implications for developing countries. See http://www.iprsonline.org/unctadictsd/docs/CS_Barton.pdf or contact [email protected] for more information.
02/05/2004
On 7-8 April 2004, the 2nd Conference on Biotechnology for Asian Development was held in New Delhi, India, organised by the Research and Information System for the Non-Aligned and Other Developing Countries (RIS) and with the support, among others, of the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). The conference covered issues such as food security in Asia, intellectual property rights, trade, labelling and traceability, socio-economic impacts and private-public partnerships. Presentations are available at http://www.ris.org.in/SecCon/Program.htm or contact [email protected] for more information.
01/05/2004
A report providing an update of activities implemented by the ICGEB Biosafety Unit for the year 2003, as well as an outlook of possible new programmes that may involve the International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (ICGEB) in the future, is now available. See http://www.icgeb.org/biosafety/bsfbroch.htm or contact [email protected] for more information.
09/04/2004
On 2 April 2004, FAO launched "Developing Country Biotechnology Profiles", a searchable database which aims to provide easy access to key, updated sources of information regarding biotechnology-related policies, regulations and activities of individual developing countries. It is a new feature in FAO-BioDeC and is accessed by clicking the "Country Profiles" button on the left hand menu of the FAO-BioDeC webpage ( http://www.fao.org/biotech/inventory_admin/dep/default.asp). The purpose of the database is to compile, organise and render easily accessible information that is currently distributed in a number of places and that may be difficult to find. Information for each country may be provided on the following 11 subjects: biotechnology research policy; research capacity (key institutions; summary of major research programmes); biotechnology regulatory framework (biosafety; food safety; patents; plant variety protection; plant genetic resources; animal genetic resources); biotechnology applications and, finally, publications and links. Entries are in English and users can search on any combination of subject, developing country or region as well as carry out a free text search. Contact [email protected] to provide comments (always welcome!) or to request more information.
08/04/2004
The FAO Electronic Forum on Biotechnology in Food and Agriculture is devoting its next e-mail conference to the theme of biotechnology in food processing in developing countries. This will be the 11th conference hosted by the Forum since it was launched in March 2000. The conference, as usual, is open to everyone, is free and will be moderated. It runs from 14 June to 9 July 2004. All messages posted during the conference will be placed on the Forum website ( http://www.fao.org/biotech/forum.asp). You are hereby invited to join the Forum and to participate in the conference!! To join the Forum (and also register for the conference), send an e-mail to [email protected] leaving the subject blank and entering the following text on two lines:subscribe BIOTECH-Lsubscribe biotech-room3Those who are already Forum members should leave out the first line of the above message, to register for the conference. For more information, contact [email protected].
07/04/2004
On 31 March 2004, 12 countries and the European Community ratified the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture bringing to 48 the number of countries worldwide that have ratified the agreement. It will therefore enter into force on 29 June 2004. The objectives of this new legally-binding Treaty are the conservation and sustainable use of plant genetic resources for food and agriculture and the fair and equitable sharing of benefits derived from their use for sustainable agriculture and food security. The implementation of the Treaty will be an important contribution to the achievement of the World Food Summit`s major objective of halving the number of hungry people by 2015. All will benefit, from farmers to consumers, including researchers and breeders from both the public and the private sectors. See the International Treaty web page ( http://www.fao.org/ag/cgrfa/itpgr.htm) or contact [email protected] for more information. See the FAO news release at http://www.fao.org/newsroom/en/news/2004/39887/index.html (in Arabic, English, French and Spanish).
06/04/2004
The Intergovernmental Technical Working Group on Animal Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (established by the FAO Commission on Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture in 1997) held its 3rd Session from 31 March to 2 April 2004 in FAO Headquarters, Rome, Italy. One of the information documents provided is entitled "Measurement of domestic animal diversity - a review of recent diversity studies", based mainly on feedback to a questionnaire sent worldwide to research teams working with genetic distancing. The review analyses data from 86 projects, covering a wide range of domestic animal species in 93 different countries. Many topics are considered in the 38-page document, including the number/type of genetic markers analysed, the genetic distance measure used, the methods and computer programmes employed in constructing phylogenetic trees and costs of the projects. See the document (567 KB) or contact [email protected] for more information.
05/04/2004
As part of its Forest Health & Biosecurity Working Papers series, FAO has just published "Biosecurity and forests: An introduction - with particular emphasis on forest pests" by M.J.W. Cock. The term "Biosecurity" describes the concept and process of managing biological risks associated with food and agriculture, and the paper is the first attempt to explore the role of biosecurity in the forestry sector. The publication includes a discussion on genetically modified forest trees. See http://www.fao.org/docrep/006/j1467e/J1467E00.htmor contact [email protected] for more information or to provide comments.
04/04/2004
FAO and WHO, in collaboration with the International Life Sciences Institute (ILSI), held a workshop on "Detection of protein and/or DNA in foods derived from modern biotechnology" on 5 March 2004 in Budapest, Hungary, immediately prior to the 25th session of the Codex Committee on Methods of Analysis and Sampling. The 5-page workshop report is now available. See ftp://ftp.fao.org/es/esn/food/meetings/2004/hungary_report.pdf or contact [email protected] for more information.
03/04/2004
The United Nations Environment Programme recently released the "GEO Latin America and the Caribbean: Environment Outlook 2003" report, as part of the Global Environment Outlook (GEO) project. According to the Introduction, "it is the most important report on the state of the environment in Latin America and the Caribbean". The second chapter of this 279-page publication deals with priority themes for the region: land and food, forest, biodiversity, freshwater, marine and coastal areas, atmosphere, human settlements, health, natural threats and disasters. The section on biodiversity includes a discussion about gene flow from genetically modified maize in Mexico. The previous GEO report for the region was published in 2000. See http://www.pnuma.org (available in English and Spanish) or contact [email protected] for more information.
02/04/2004
The Centro Internacional de Agricultura Tropical (CIAT), one of the 15 research centres supported by the CGIAR, has made the book "Cultivo de tejidos en la agricultura: Fundamentos y aplicaciones", edited by W.M. Roca and L.A. Mroginski, available on the web. It contains 38 chapters and a series of appendices. The first part (16 chapters) deals with the basis concepts, methodologies and techniques of plant tissue culture; the second part (16 chapters) covers the application of tissue culture to numerous agriculturally important species while the third part (6 chapters) includes applications of biochemical and molecular techniques to tissue culture. The 1993 edition of the book is sold out. See http://www.ciat.cgiar.org/biotechnology/cultivo_tejidos/contenido.pdf or contact [email protected] for more information.
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