Agric & Biotech

A potential wood supplier for one of the world’s largest pulp and paper mills does not have the consent of local communities A joint investigation report released on Wednesday, March 8 2017 by Indonesian NGOs titled “Local Communities Reject PT. Bangun Rimba Sejahtera, Potential Supplier to APP’s OKI Mill”, details the opposition of local communities to the development of industrial ...

GMOs: Biosafety agency The National Biosafety Management Agency (NBMA) and the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) have met in Abuja, the federal capital city, to strengthen the working relationship between the two agencies in the bid to effectively regulate the importation of genetically-modified (GM) foods to ensure that only safe GM foods are allowed in the country. Rufus Ebegba, DG/CEO of ...

Biotechnology and Biosafety Recently, there was a news report that the National Inter-Religious Council (NIREC) cautioned the Nigerian government with regard to permitting Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs) foods into Nigeria. That significant report may have escaped many Nigerians. However, the strident denial by the directors general of National Biotechnology Development Agency (NABDA) and National Biosafety Management Agency (NBMA) that they were not members of the NIREC ...

Key players involved in oil palm in Indonesia have highlighted the need for equal rights and opportunities for women and men. Panelists at a policy dialogue on gender and oil palm in Jakarta on Friday, March 3 2017 outlined the need for women to have a bigger say in decisions related to land, employment and smallholder inclusion. The Centre for ...

The Central Log Control of the Ogun State Ministry of Forestry has uncovered a plot by lumbermen to cart away forest resources from the state through its borders with Ondo State. Commissioner for Forestry, Kolawole Lawal, who made the disclosure recently in Abeokuta, stated that some illegal tree merchants in Laagan, a border village between Ogun and Ondo states, had constructed ...

Syngenta’s Seedcare programme for smallholder farmers in Senegal has led to impressive yield increases, the firm has said. It lists these increases to include those for pearl millet (1.2 t/ha, +40%), sorghum (1.1 t/ha, +86%), maize (2.7 t/ha, +101%), irrigated rice (9.4 t/ha, +11%) and rain-fed rice (2.0 t/ha, +33%). The achievements, from year one of a Syngenta project in ...

The Ogun State Government is finalising plans to establish eco-tourism resort in its forest reserve in an apparent bid to enhance forestry resources and create an alternative means of livelihood for the people of the state. Commissioner for Forestry, Kolawole Lawal, who made this known recently in Abeokuta, the state capital, while speaking with journalists after an interactive session with ...

Once again, stakeholders appear to have brought to the fore, critical issues and concerns of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) and the Nigerian Biosafety Management Act 2015. At a daylong gathering in Benin City, Edo State on Wednesday, February 22 2017, participants brainstormed on what they perceive as “the increased aggressive push of the biotechnology companies in partnership with their local ...

The National Biosafety Management Agency (NBMA) has said that its Director-General / CEO, Dr. Rufus Ebegba, is not a member of the National Inter-Religious Council (NIREC). The agency disclosed in a statement on Friday, February 24 2017 that a media report listing its Dr. Ebegba as a member of the NIREC was untrue. The statement reads: “The Agency wishes to ...

Mankind’s future ability to feed itself is in jeopardy due to intensifying pressures on natural resources, mounting inequality, and the fallout from a changing climate, warns a new FAO report. Though very real and significant progress in reducing global hunger has been achieved over the past 30 years, “expanding food production and economic growth have often come at a heavy ...