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Can biotech from St. Louis solve hunger in Africa? (9/12/2006)

1.Can biotech from St. Louis solve hunger in Africa?
2.St. Louis team fights crop killer in Africa

GM WATCH COMENT: Monsanto's home town paper - the St Louis Post-Dispatch - has launched a three-day series that claims to explore "hunger in Africa and the role that biotech has in stemming it".

Its "Special Report: Feeding Africa" starts by looking at the work of Monsanto's "non-profit" partner in St Louis, the Danforth Center.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/profile1.asp?PrId=200

According to the Post-Dispatch, "The center is trying to give away a genetically engineered cassava, one of the most important foods in Africa. A spreading virus is wiping out the crop. The St. Louis scientists think they have the cure."

The "spreading virus" is the African cassava mosaic virus (CMVD), and the article speculates that the Danforth Center's GM virus-resistant cassava could be the first "nonprofit biotech product" to help "the developing world".

Only a few months ago, however, the Danforth Center quietly admitted that it had discovered that its GM cassava varieties had actually lost their resistance to CMVD. (GM cassava fails in Africa)
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=6979

According to the article, the cassava has now been re-engineered. What the article doesn't mention, though, is that the failure of the previous GM varieties actually took 7 years to show up, making it more than a little early to be talking up a cure for the virus.

Interestingly, the Post-Dispatch article does note that "traditional breeders already have had some success creating a resistant cassava". Although it repeats Danforth Center claims that the variety in question is not popular with local famers, it doesn't tell us why traditional breeding couldn't be used just as successfully with more popular local varieties.

The article also admits the failure of Monsanto's showcase project in Africa, the GM sweet potato - a failure always staunchly denied by the scientist Monsanto trained to front the project, Florence Wambugu.
http://www.lobbywatch.org/profile1.asp?PrId=131

EXTRACT: "In 1992, Monsanto donated training and money to a Kenyan scientist to make a virus-resistant sweet potato. A decade later, after millions of dollars in funding, field tests showed the modified variety no less vulnerable to disease than conventional sweet potatoes."

MORE

Special Report: Feeding Africa
http://www.stltoday.com/africa

See an audio slideshow about cassava
http://graphics.stltoday.com/online/africa

Scientists say biotech safe to eat, but worries linger http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/sciencemedicine/story/20DE4EE08FAD7A808625723F0001415C?OpenDocument

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1.Can biotech from St. Louis solve hunger in Africa?
By Kurt Greenbaum
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH, 9 December 2006
http://www.stltoday.com/blogs/news-talk-of-the-day/2006/12/can-biotech-from-st-louis-solve-hunger-in-africa/

This note is posted on behalf of Post-Dispatch reporter Eric Hand:

In Sunday’s Post-Dispatch and here on STLtoday.com, we began a three-day series that explores hunger in Africa and the role that biotech has in stemming it.

First we look at the work of the nonprofit Donald Danforth Plant Science Center in Creve Coeur. The center is trying to give away a genetically engineered cassava, one of the most important foods in Africa. A spreading virus is wiping out the crop. The St. Louis scientists think they have the cure.

On the second day, we look at hunger. AIDS and other diseases get plenty of money and attention. Hunger, a forgotten child killer, gets less. Famine relief is always available. But money to boost agricultural yields is scarcer. Would better harvests solve hunger?

On the third day, we look at the history of biotech in Africa, which is caught in a trade war between the United States and Europe.

Africa is as poor as it was 50 years ago, and hunger continues to grow. What can be done?

Is biotech part of the solution? Some people think it is part of the problem. Your thoughts?

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2.St. Louis team fights crop killer in Africa
By Eric Hand ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH, 9 December 2006
http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/sciencemedicine/story/0E96D8B196362C0A8625723F0022D403?OpenDocument

NAKItoma, uganda - The sleepy main street of Nakitoma, with its pancake seller and bicycle repairman, is little different from that of other provincial towns - just a flash of weathered, empty storefronts on the pocked road.

Barefoot children chase cars, calling out, "Bye-bye, Museveni!" For if someone is driving a car around here, he must be someone important, such as Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni.

It is a forgettable place, except for one thing: It is the epicenter of a pandemic whose shock waves still are ravaging Africa.

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