Farmers and other interest groups in Uganda are reported to be jubilating as the country’s parliament finally passed the Biosafety bill.
As a farmer in Ibanda district in western Uganda, Joseph Katushabe, declared upon hearing that Parliament had passed the National Biotechnology and Biosafety (NBB) Bill, 2012, “Now that we have a law in place, drought and diseases will become history as we will be able to apply modern technology backed by research for better yields”. A report from Kampala says the controversial bill, which was passed at the beginning of this month, has been on and off the shelves since 2012, leaving both politicians and scientists divided.
The clauses that were controversial include – transportation of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) for export or import without the approval of a competent authority will become a criminal offense in Uganda. Defaulters risked paying a fine of 2.4 million Uganda shillings or be jailed for five years.
If President Yoweri Museveni signs the bill into law, it will consolidate all regulatory frameworks that facilitate the safe development and application of biotechnology by establishing a competent authority, designating a national focal point, a national biosafety committee, institutional biosafety committees and also provide mechanisms to regulate research and the general release of GMOs.
Biotechnology is a technique that uses substances from living organisms to modify a product, improve plants, animal breeds or micro-organisms for specific purposes. Biosafety means safe development, transfer, application and utilisation of biotechnology and its products.
While presenting the report of the Science and Technology Committee that studied the bill, its chairperson, Kafeero Ssekitoleko, said Uganda has no specific law regulating the development and use of modern biotechnology, while the country had ratified some international treaties, such as the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) in 1993 and the Cartagena Protocol Biosafety of 2001.
According to Ssekitoleko “Our scientists are working for Uganda to own its patents and technology so that we are not obliged to foreigners”.
The bill gave the green light to the Uganda National Council for Science and Technology (UNSCT) as the competent biotechnology and biosafety authority that will approve the development, testing and use of GMOs.
The advocates of the Bill assert that GMOs have the potential to boost food, fuel and fiber production, which will accelerate economic growth and foreign exchange earnings, as it is in South Africa and Burkina Faso.
The Coordinator of the Uganda Biosciences Information Centre, Dr. Barbara Zawedde Mugwanga, said the passing of the bill means that the country can regulate what is coming in. “We can now also choose what we want to use in modern biotechnology in agriculture, medicine, environment management and medicine”, she said.
