Latest Agribusiness Resources

A highly successful health food company in the United States, Silver Plate Inc, is seeking to cash in on the health benefits of sorghum. More particularly, it has begun to commercialize foods rich in sorghum anthocyanins, natural “antioxidant” chemicals found in some strongly coloured plant foods that are believed to have heart and other health […]

Media Advisory from the African Centre for Biosafety Johannesburg, 8th December 2010. The African Centre for Biosafety applauds the decision of the Competition Commission not to approve the take-over of Pannar Seed, South Africa’s largest seed company, by the multinational corporation and seed giant, Pioneer Hi-Bred, a subsidiary of the DuPont chemical company. The ACB […]

As a stakeholder, the ACB was requested by the Competition Commission to make written comments on the proposed merger between Pioneer Hi Bred and Pannar, which we submitted to the Commission on the 21st of October, 2010. In this submission, we raise the following further pertinent issues: We provide in several annexes, the seeds under […]

The African Centre for Biosafety (ACB) is deeply concerned about the Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (DAFF), Tina Joemat-Petersson’s statements on 8th of October 2010 that South Africa’s biofuels strategy should be revised to include maize. The Minister’s stance has been influenced by the huge surplus of conventional and GM maize produced by South […]

A 16-page booklet by Edward Hammond. Read here. View the press release here.

Author: Edward Hammond About the briefing: The interlocking problems of climate change, emissions from fossil fuels, and limited oil reserves have stimulated interest worldwide in the use of plant crops to produce fuel. Agrofuels are not a new idea. Brazil, for instance, has used them on a large scale for many years. The potential scale […]

The South African government has readily embraced the establishment of an agrofuels industry, citing job creation, the need for clean and renewable energy and the creation of markets for small-holder farmers, as key motivators. Nevertheless, it is our view that the logic of the Biofuels Strategy to introduce large-scale, mono-crop agriculture into the former homelands […]