Latest Resources

27 July 2007
ACB Submission on IPRs from Publicaly Funded Research Bill, 2007
Currently, South African intellectual property legislation is highly fragmented, a situation that gives rise to a number of gaps and anomalies that undermine the rights of indigenous people. “Indigenous people” is not clearly defined by NEMBA or it Draft Regulations except to refer to such people as residing in a defined geographical area to which […]

27 July 2007
ACB ALERT: Spate of New GM Experiments in SA
ACB ALERT: NEW GM EXPERIMENTS IN SOUTH AFRICA, JULY 2007 It is with extreme disquiet that the African Centre for Biosafety notes the recent spate of new applications for GM experiments in South Africa, see below. We are extremely concerned that our government has laid our country open to the wholesale experimentation involving a whole […]

26 July 2007
Monsanto’s “Seed of Hope Campaign” in South Africa: A Briefing document, Januar...
Monsanto has conceived of an ingenious smallholders’ programme known as the ‘Seeds of Hope Campaign’, which targets the ‘bottom of the pyramid’-very low-income consumers who have substantial purchasing power as a group. Closed markets in Europe, worldwide consumer rejection, heated international debates about the risks of GMOs, and the intransigence of Africa, sans, South Africa, […]

20 July 2007
Submission on the Draft Biofuels Industrial Strategy
By: Earthlife Africa eThekwini Branch – African Centre for Biosafety – GRAIN – SAFeAGE – Ekogaia -The Third World Investment Gateway Trust To: Department of Minerals and Energy 31 March 2007 Read submission here.

20 June 2007
Regulation of GMOs in South Africa: details & short comings
The ACB has been motivated to write this paper by the coming into effect on the 17th April 2007, of the Genetically Modified Organisms Amendment Act (No. 23 of 2006). (ii) This amends the Genetically Modified Organisms Act No. 15 of 1997 (‘GMO Act’), 10 years after it became part of the body of post-apartheid […]

27 May 2007
Trojan Horse for GMOs
After more than 10 years of genetically modified (GM) crop plants being grown in the world, only South Africa out of 53 countries on the African continent have commercial plantings of genetically modified organisms (GMOs). Nine countries: Burkina Faso; Egypt; Kenya; Morocco; Senegal; South Africa; Tanzania; Zambia; and Zimbabwe have reported field trials of GMOs, […]

8 March 2007
Biofuels Africa Alert: Africa’s Biodiesel: Going Nuts
It is with extreme disquiet that the African Centre for Biosafety notes the recent spate of new applications for GM experiments in South Africa, see below. We are extremely concerned that our government has laid our country open to the wholesale experimentation involving a whole new range of GM applications, in a context where there […]

11 February 2007
South Africa – Biosafety Policy
Submissions On Draft Biosafety Policy, Government Notice 1576 Of 2005, Published By The Department Of Agriculture, 26 August 2005 Mariam Mayet, Sep 2005. Read here.

11 February 2007
Mauritius – GMO Legislation
The Mauritian Paradox Selva Appasawmy, April 2004 OVERVIEW Mauritius has introduced legislation to regulate genetically modified organisms (GMOs) and its associated activities. This legislation perhaps represents the most stringent precautionary regulations yet on the African continent. As a Party to the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety (Biosafety Protocol), the Mauritian government can also be said to […]

11 February 2007
Malawi – GMO Legislation
The government of Malawi published its biosafety draft regulations in The Malawi Gazette Supplement on 13 September 2002 (“biosafety law”), at the height of the GM food aid controversy when several countries in Southern Africa imposed restrictions on the acceptance of genetically modified food aid from the United States. Malawi accepted the GM food aid, […]