Since April 2022, Nigeria has played host to scientists, regulators and policymakers from three African countries that have come to understudy, and benchmark the progress made by Nigeria in the deployment of biotechnology in the agricultural sector.
The visitors came from Ghana, Ethiopia, and Mozambique in recognition of Nigeria’s success in the deployment, management, and development of products of modern biotechnology including genetically modified crops.
Nigeria, in the last few years, released Bt. Cotton, Pod Borer Resistant Cowpea and TELA Maize which were developed by scientists at the Institute for Agricultural Research (IAR), Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria. This development, which placed in the hands of farmers better yielding cowpea and cotton varieties,has changed the mentality of our farmers and their perception ofbiotechnology.
Although this Cowpea was handed over to farmers in 2020 after a national performance trial on farmers’fields in 2019, their testimonies are so encouraging that scientists are already thinking about the possibility of improving other crops in the country using biotechnological tools.
Receiving the delegates from Ethiopia and Mozambique recently, the Minister of Environment, Hon. Mohammed H. Abdullahi noted that hitherto African countries go to the west to learn about new technologies and their applications.
“The unfortunate thing about this learning is that you see it working over there but over here, domesticating these technologies becomes a crucial challenge for Africans but this new development of Africans learning from one another is fantastic and a thing we should all promote,” the minister said.
The Minister’s observation was also re-echoed by the Director General, National Biotechnology Development Agency (NABDA) when he hosted the visiting team. “We now have the opportunity to learn from each other as Africans. We share histories, cultures and ways of understanding and most importantly, our ecologies and agricultural practices are the same so exchanging ideas and learning from each other is the best way African countries can quickly adopt and integrate technologies into their agricultural improvement programmes.”
The Director-General, Agricultural Research Institute of Mozambique, Dr Olga Fafetine, said it was necessary for her country to visit Nigeria to understand the country’s process of research and benchmark her achievement in biosafety and biotechnology applications.
She said Nigeria’s achievement in the regulatory process of crops which are genetically modified was one of their reasons to visit. “We are at the same level in maize, we are in the process of releasing it into the environment, we are waiting for the permission of our authorities, we need to learn from the experience of Nigeria and how the process was held in Nigeria. We are taking some lessons for our country to improve our process.”
On the particular lesson learnt, Fafetine said the process of research trials and the release of genetically modified crops is what Mozambique will learn and replicate back home.
“The success in cotton and cowpea which Nigeria has recorded is a model not only to Mozambique but to all African countries”.
The President, of the Biotechnology Society and Chairman of the Variety Release Committee of Ethiopia, Prof. FirewMekbib, said the feat Nigeria has achieved in the application of biotechnology is evidence that Africans can be food secure with the application and adoption of biotechnology.
He said: “We have very good evidence of PBR cowpea in Nigeria, so no one can tell us whether biotechnology works for Africa or not because we already have the evidence, and we can attest to that.No one can prescribe to us what technology to adopt or reject, now we have biotechnology evidence and successes here in Africa, we don’t need to go to the US, Brazil, and Argentina to go and learn, Nigeria has provided us that opportunity”.
The delegates from Ghana comprising scientists, regulators and members of the parliament came to Nigeria to studyhow Nigeria managed and released its first genetically modified food crop, three months after, Ghana also granted environmental release to Pod Borer Resistant Cowpea developed by scientists at her Savanna Agricultural Research Institute, making them the second country in the world to release GM cowpea.
What does this developmenthold for Nigeria? It means Nigeria is gradually waking up to her responsibilities as the giant and leader of Africa and reinforcing the saying that if Nigeria gets it right, then Africa’s hope of attaining self-sufficiency in food production will be guaranteed.
This new wave of scientific cooperation between African countries has also opened up the possibility of an emerging economic powerhouse that thinks inward, utilizing the vast human resources available on the continent and more importantly, it has placed great emphasis on the need for our government to fund research and development. The potentialfor African scientists to takea global lead in discovery, innovation and inventions should not be underrated.
All over the world, African scientists in mathematics, physics, chemistry and biology have been able to prove themselves and are now forces to be reckoned with.What is needed now is a platform that will enable them contribute to the emancipation of the continent from the shackles of poverty, hunger, insecurity and lack.