Latest Resources
3 March 2025
On-going assaults on our food system and peoples’ health
Legal loopholes to allow continued use of highly hazardous pesticides, GM crops On the 27th of February, the ACB submitted substantive objections to the South African government’s attempt to backtrack on its commitments to phase out highly hazardous pesticides (HHPs), including glufosinate ammonium (GLA), by way of spurious and potentially unlawful “derogation” regulations. The rise […]
22 October 2024
Resistance against “bogus” drought tolerant (DT) maize in South Africa: a snapshot of two decades...
UPDATE: After nine years of arduous litigation by the ACB, a full bench of the Supreme Court of Appeal on 22 October 2024 set aside several layers of decision-making regarding the approval of the application by Monsanto, now Bayer, for commercial release of its drought-tolerant genetically modified maize, MON87460. 28 June 2023 UPDATE: In 2023, […]
4 March 2019
Failure of Monsanto’s drought tolerant maize pushed on Africa – confirmed in US
The ACB shares with you a blog written by ACB’s Sabrina Masinjila and Anne Maina from Biodiversity and Biosafety Association (BIBA), Kenya A recent United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) report confirms what independent biosafety scientists, and African civil society, have been stating all along: Monsanto’s drought tolerant (DT) maize (MON87460) does not work! The […]
16 January 2019
Africa Group captured by colonial medicine, agribusiness and US military interests on gene drives...
On the pretext of supporting scientific innovation for malaria eradication, African countries vociferously defended a techno-fix that does not address the wider determinants of malaria – but rather, represents the changing face of colonial medicine and threatens the biodiversity of an entire continent. At the UN’s recent Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), a proposal to […]
1 November 2018
Demystifying GM maize through collective action on World Food Day
In an effort to highlight the complex and concentrated South African agricultural and food system, with its unsustainable and deepening inequality, the African Centre for Biodiversity (ACB) and partner organisations initiated a “no GMO-maize campaign” earlier in 2018. This was followed up in August 2018, with a meeting of organisations that included Zingisa, Ntinga Ntaba […]
30 October 2018
Reflections on ITPGRFA, UPOV 1991 and South Africa
Recently the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (DAFF) held national consultations on whether South Africa should accede to two international agreements related to seed: The International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (ITPGRFA, or the Treaty) and the International Convention on the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV) 1991. The […]
14 June 2018
Restrict, regulate and reduce corporate power in South Africa’s food system
I attended a dialogue on corporate ownership in South Africa in May, in Tshwane, hosted by Trade and Industrial Policy Strategies (TIPS). There was strong government representation at the dialogue, including from Treasury; Trade and Industry; Minerals and Energy; and Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation. Someone from the EU was also there. Corporate concentration is a […]
6 June 2018
Bayer opposes black economic empowerment in purchase of Monsanto
The Competition Tribunal announced the finalisation of the merger between Bayer and Monsanto in South Africa in May. Bayer had taken the original conditions imposed by the Competition Commission in 2017 to the Tribunal for reassessment. These included selling businesses to black economic empowerment (BEE) compliant companies. Bayer has claimed confidentiality on the conditions, making […]
15 December 2017
Harmonised corporate seed laws in Africa: Where does this leave smallholder farmers?
The expansion of the corporate seed market, embedded in the green revolution agenda in sub-Saharan Africa is progressing very fast. This expansion is going hand in hand with regional policies and regulations – in a process also known as seed harmonisation – that will enable facilitate trade across national borders. This has been the case […]
19 September 2017
Erosion of farmers’ seed and agricultural systems in Tanzania
There are no simple answers when it comes to predicting the future of African food systems. Across the continent, the push to commercialise African agriculture to feed the growing and urbanising population, increase incomes, and reduce poverty is well known. However, this ‘solution’ is also heavily criticised for its ineffective, inappropriate and misdirected approach for […]