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USAID Administrator Fore and Agriculture Secretary Schafer speak on biotechnology
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3 June 2008
United States and the Philippines Co-Host Panel Discussion on Biotechnology, June 3, 2008
High Level Conference on Food Security
Rome, Italy
On June 3, United States Secretary of Agriculture Ed Schafer and Director of U.S. Foreign Assistance and USAID Administrator Henrietta Fore, together with Philippines Secretary of Agriculture Arthur Yap, co-hosted a panel discussion on the benefits of agricultural biotechnology. The discussion took place on the margins of the High-Level Conference on World Food Security taking place in Rome.
In his opening remarks, Secretary Schafer discussed the benefits that crops produced through biotechnology can bring to both developed and developing countries, such as helping to make food more plentiful, available, and affordable.
The Secretary outlined the United States’ three-pronged strategy to address high food prices now and in the long term, which includes support for biotechnology. Secretary Schafer said that the international community must work together to identify and introduce existing and new technologies that increase food production. Biotechnology offers important benefits for developing countries and small farmers by improving the productivity of agriculture and increasing incomes of the rural poor.
Director Fore highlighted the fact that biotechnology-based crops are currently grown in over 20 countries, including India, China, and South Africa. The United States is working to ensure that appropriate biotechnology tools are available to all farmers who need them.
Secretary Yap and the three panelists – C.S. Karim, Advisor to the Ministry of Agriculture in Bangladesh, Dr. Shivaji Pandey, the Director of the Food and Agriculture Organization’s Plant Protection Division, and Laurent Sedogo, the Minister of Agriculture, Water and Fisheries of Burkina Faso – outlined various ongoing efforts to develop and deploy biotechnology.
In addition to the development of pest-resistant or higher-yielding plants, panelists also discussed the applications for biotechnology tools in non-agricultural areas such as fisheries. The Philippines, for example, has used biotechnology to develop pathogen-resistant shrimp.
Several panelists highlighted the benefits that biotechnology tools can bring to small farmers, as they are particularly vulnerable to economic hardship if their crops are destroyed by natural catastrophes or pests, and at the same time have much to gain from the benefits of increased yields and hardier plants. Worldwide, biotechnology has the potential to benefit many more people through increased agricultural productivity.
Panelists noted the importance of bringing farmers and civil society into an open-minded, science-based conversation about such technologies, and of establishing a regulatory framework for their use.
