"Europeans who reject bio-technology are doing so on full stomachs", according to the forward to Dr Florence Wambugu's new book on how "Africa's poor and hungry could be saved by genetically modified foods" (see the article below). The book, 'Modifying Africa', argues GM crops are pretty much a panacea for African poverty and hunger as they will increase food production, decrease prices and improve farmer incomes.

But the array of voices outside well-fed Europe questioning the potential of GM crops to do what Dr Wambugu claims, do not seem to have caught the attention of the author of the forward to Dr Wambugu's book.

Famously, delegates from 22 African countries (including Kenya) to the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation objected in a written statement, "that the image of the poor and hungry from our countries is being used by giant multinational corporations to push a technology that is neither safe, environmentally friendly, nor economically beneficial to us."

According to  Dr Wambugu, however, it's not the corporations who are seeking to profit out of African poverty. As she told the New Scientist, "I think the anti-biotechnology lobbyists are the only people benefiting out of this." [ 27 May 2000]

An ex-Monsanto trained scientist and an advisor to DuPont, Florence Wambugu is now employed to promote biotech in Africa by the ISAAA -- a biotechnology transfer organisation understood to receive a major part of its funding from the gene giants who are even represented on its board (currently Novartis have a seat, as prior to that did Monsanto). [For more on the ISAAA, see the GRAIN briefing: 'ISAAA in Asia -- Promoting Corporate Profit in the Name of the Poor' - http://www.grain.org/publications/reports/isaaa.htm]

Florence Wambugu's relationship with the industry organisation, Africabio, has also attracted controversy. According to the co-ordinator of Biowatch South Africa:

"Dr Wambugu participated in public debate here and became almost hysterical when her tactic of using her daughter in the audience to question and attack those critical of genetic engineering was exposed. To us, these fellow Africans paid by the big US corporations to promote GE without applying any critical thought are like people who have no memory, no history. People like Dr Wambugu... were brought here by Africabio to present a "politically correct" face to the organisation, the same reason they are targeting small farmers here. Africabio is an industry front organisation whose aim is to promote GE in Africa and prevent any trade barriers to its members." [letter to the Daily Nation, Wednesday, September 20, 2000]

So perhaps the author of the forward to 'Modifying Africa', Dr Romano Kiomi,  should also ponder whether those who promote bio-technology are doing so on empty stomachs.

For while many may remain sceptical about the evidential base for Florence Wambugu's claims of big benefits from 'modifying' Africa, when it comes to biotech improving incomes, Dr Wambugu almost certainly speaks from personal experience.

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GM food may save Africa, says scientist
http://www.iol.co.za/html/frame_news.php?click_id=143&art_id=ct20010801205503389G51699

Africa's poor and hungry could be saved by genetically modified foods, a Kenyan agricultural scientist said in Durban on Wednesday.  Dr Florence Wambugu was in the city to launch her new book, Modifying Africa, which extols the virtues of genetically modified food.  She said the continent ought to be making more use of bio-technology and that the future of Africa's agriculture lay in genetically modified foods.

She said field trials of a range of GM foods were at an advanced stage in Kenya, and several new products were likely to be on the market soon.  Among the advantages of agriculturally based bio-technology was an increase in the production of food. At the same time, prices to consumers could be lowered and the incomes of poor farmers raised.  Writing in the foreword to the book, Dr Romano Kiomi, director of the Kenyan Agricultural Research Institute, says Europeans who reject bio-technology are doing so on full stomachs.

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Prof. Wangari Mathai of the Green Belt Movement, Kenya:

"History has many records of crimes against humanity, which were also justified by dominant commercial interests and governments of the day... Today, patenting of life forms and the genetic engineering which it stimulates, is being justified on the grounds that it will benefit society, especially the poor, by providing better and more food and medicine. But in fact, by monopolising the 'raw' biological materials, the development of other options is deliberately blocked. Farmers therefore, become totally dependent on the corporations for seeds".
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Dr Hans R. Herren, Director General, The International Centre of Insect Physiology and Ecology, Kenya:

"...farmers are likely to be weaned from pesticides to be force fed biotech seeds, in other words, taken off one treadmill and set on a new one! The trend towards a quasi-monopolization of funding in agricultural development into a narrow set of technologies is dangerous and irresponsible. Also, too many hopes and expectations are being entrusted in these technologies, to the detriment of more conventional and proven technologies and approaches that have been very successful and which potential lies mostly unused in the developing countries. ."
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Vandana Shiva on the biotech industry's use of CS Prakash and Florence Wambugu:

"It's a hoax. Now these are suddenly brown skins and black skins like us, so they're suddenly supposed to be speaking for the Third World."  [Engineering Crops in a Needy World, by John Biewen, Amercian Radio Works]