Latest Resources

25 September 2012
Statement on AGRA (Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa)
At a farmers rights meeting held in Uganda in September 2012, where a statement was drawn up and signed by many concerned parties. Read the statement here. Signatures:

25 September 2012
Open Letter to African Governments and AGRA (The Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa)
The undersigned 28 civil society organisations support and represent the interests of smallholder farmers and livestock keepers from Ethiopia, Kenya, Mozambique, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, and Zimbabwe, and are concerned with the conservation of agricultural biodiversity for livelihood security and food sovereignty. View the full statement here.

4 July 2012
Comments on COMESA’s Draft Policy on Commercial Planting, Trade and Emergency Food Aid Invo...
On the 8th and 9th May 2012 COMESA held a meeting in Lusaka, Zambia, to review a draft policy on the regulation and trade of GMOs for the region. While the Biotech Industry was very well represented at the meeting, civil society was completely left out of the process. This policy is being drafted behind […]

9 March 2011
Alert to anti-GM activists in Egypt, India, Mexico and South Korea
South Africa’s GM maize flooding into your countries!!! The African Centre for Biosafety (ACB) has been monitoring the GMO landscape in South Africa since 2004. As recently as three years ago South Africa was importing millions of tons of GM maize from Argentina, used mainly in the animal feed industry. During 2010, South African maize […]

2 March 2011
Title Submission to the Dept of Justice on the Promotion of Access to Information Amendment Bill-...
Following the promulgation of the Genetically Modified Organisms Act in 1997, numerous GMOs have been approved in South Africa. The 1997 GMO Act was amended in 2006, and the new regulations took effect on the 26th of February 2010. This submission sets out details of our problems in accessing information from government with regard to […]

2 March 2011
ACB submission to the Secretariat of the Biosafety Protocol – discussions on socio-economic...
28 May 2011 The Secretariat of the Biosafety Protocol is engaging in discussions on socio-economic provisions related to decision-making and GMOs (Article 26). The ACB has submitted several studies from South Africa to enrich this discussion and has applied to participate in online discussions. These documents highlight South African experiences regarding the rejection of GM […]

16 February 2011
Response to the Environment Green Paper 2010
The ACB has submitted comments on the Department of Environmental Affairs’ National Climate Change Response Green Paper. Read here.

31 January 2011
ACB comments on Regulations to the Consumer Protection Act related to labelling of Genetically Mo...
Download the Report.

10 November 2010
Opposition to Pioneer Hi Bred’s merger with Pannar, submitted to Competitions Commission
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 […]

19 October 2010
ACB Submission to the Department of Trade and Industry on the Intellectual Property Amendment Bil...
The Intellectual Property Amendment Bill aims to strengthen intellectual property rights relating to traditional performances, traditional work, traditional terms of expressions and traditional designs. The Bill has been widely condemned as sounding the death knell for traditional knowledge as it attempts to provide protection for Traditional Knowledge (TK) within a western intellectual property regime, originally […]