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Legal cover need to address potential risks of Genetically Modified Organisms
FAISALABAD (November 24 2002) : Pakistan needs a sound legal framework to address the potential risks of Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs), said Professor Dr Riaz Hussain Qureshi, vice-chancellor, University of Agriculture Faisalabad (UAF).
Addressing a partners consultation workshop on "bio-safety guidelines in genetic engineering and biotechnology" in Kisan Hall, he said the modern technology has led to the development of new products and processes which manifest distinct advantages for the prevention and treatment of diseases.
However, the scientists should be careful in the introduction of genetically modified organisms to avoid any possible risks of biotechnology, he added.
Quoting the failure of Bt cotton crop in Indian state of Maharashtra, he said the ensuing conflict between the Indian government and farmers for compensation should be a lesson for Pakistani farmers that how the new GMO technology could complicate the state-society relations.
Criticising the corporate lobby of the developed countries, Pro. Riaz Qureshi said that it was promoting the GMOs in the developing countries in the name of fight against hunger, adding the GMOs were under the jurisdiction of convention on biological diversity according to which every country was free either to accept or reject the them.
But at the world summit on sustainable development held in the capital of South Africa in September last, the US-led lobby tried to bring the issue of GMOs under the jurisdiction of the World Trade Organisation, he maintained.
Professor Riaz Qureshi said under the WTO regime, it was mandatory upon each signatory country to comply with its agreements, and added that due to strong opposition from African and some other developing counties, the said lobby's attempt failed.
All this research, which basically belongs to the advanced counties, has been done in a different atmosphere for different people having different genetic physical formation and different geographic conditions, he added.
"GMOs may disturb the present culture of health and production of yields in our countries", he said and asked the scientists to adopt GMOs, keeping in view of our life style, hunger and health problems.
He also appreciated the efforts of the Sustainable Agriculture Action Group (SAAG) for holding this workshop on a very touchy issue.
The second session of the workshop was presided over by Professor Dr Bashir Ahmed, Dean, Faculty of Agriculture Economics and Rural Sociology.
Dr Shahid Zia, executive director, Sungi Development Foundation, in his key-note address, said the GMOs were first introduced in the North where it prompted heated debates, ranging from labelling of GMOs to safe daily intake of GM food for an individual. As the movement against the GMOs by the consumers, manufacturers and retailers got momentum in the North; the multi-national companies (MNCs) turned their focus on South. "How could a technology harmful for one part of the world be beneficial to the other parts of the world", questioned Dr Shahid.
He said it was a great injustice that all the profits to be accrued from the GMOs business would be reaped by the MNCs of the developed world while all the environmental and health-related hazards associated with them would be borne by the people of the poor developing countries.
Other scientists defined the biotechnology in a collective term, encompassing a number of technologies, some old, others new.
Dr Bashir Ahmed stated, in his address, that as part of gene transfer technologies, target genes from unrelated organisms could be isolated and used after appropriate attachment of marker genes, the promoter and terminator sequences for expression into new hosts to improve the productivity of the organisms.
The gene transfers were considered exotic because the genes from unrelated organisms were made to express in organisms, which did not normally host them, he said.
Later, the workshop participants did an exercise of para-wise reading of the draft on bio-safety guidelines and suggested changes where they deemed them necessary.
The same exercise will be repeated on the second day of the workshop, and at the end of the workshop the participants will draft Saag's position on bio-safety guidelines, and make recommendations to the government.
Courtesy Business Recorder
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Pakissan.com; Advisory Point
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