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For nearly 20 years, Kenya has attempted to adopt the better-yielding and disease- and drought-tolerant crop varieties bred through genetic engineering. But like the rest of the continent — aside from South Africa and Sudan, which are already growing insect-resistant Bt maize and cotton — it made little tangible headway…

Fears about losing “indigenous” varieties, multinational corporate takeovers of the local seed sector and farmers becoming reliant on purchased seed are some of the top propaganda claims that anti-GMO activists raise when trying to block the adoption of genetically modified crops in Uganda and elsewhere in Africa. But an…

Why are South Africa and Sudan ahead of every other country on the continent when it comes to biotech? The answer is simple. The nations realized early on that they needed to embrace new technologies to develop faster maturing and better yielding disease-resistant and drought-tolerant crop varieties to counter a…

After building a successful career in Nigeria’s fashion industry, Patience Koku found herself disillusioned, unfulfilled. So she turned instead to farming. Though Koku has found it far more satisfying to produce food than purses and shoes, she’s also encountered significant challenges, ranging from weeds, insect pests and erratic weather to…

The Ugandan Parliament yesterday approved a bill to regulate genetically modified organisms that has scientists skeptical the technology will ever reach the smallholder farmers it is intended to help. “Once bitten, twice shy,” said plant biotechnologist Dr. Andrew Kiggundu in reference to last year’s events, when Parliament passed the bill,…

Participating in last week’s 2018 World Food Prize event for the first time was an emotional and eye-opening experience for me, as a young African woman just starting a career in science communication. I wondered what difference I could possibly make among so many people who were already doing the…

Tanzania’s second year of confined field trials already shows a striking difference between the genetically modified and conventional maize varieties. The trial of the drought-tolerant, insect-resistant TELA maize was nearly twice as tall as the conventional variety, which had been stunted by an attack of fall armyworm (FAW) and corn…

When policymakers, farmers, researchers and executives gather in Des Moines, Iowa this week they will be taking a multifaceted look at how to meet the massive global challenge of feeding an estimated nine billion people by 2050. ‘Rise to the Challenge’ is the theme of the 2018 Borlaug Dialogue, the…

Though it’s been a year since Uganda’s Parliament approved a biosafety bill to regulate genetically modified organisms, farmers and scientists remain in suspense over whether it will ever become law. Researchers had hoped the “few areas” President Yoweri Museveni cited for returning the bill would be quickly reworked, paving…