Coalition of Civil Societies Organisations and several agricultural experts including farmers have proposed a bill for an Act for the prohibition of Genetically Modified Organism (GMOs) in Nigeria, insisting that it is to guide against degeneration of health and wellbeing of Nigerians
The experts who took turns to speak at a press conference on investigative research and public hearing on GMOs.held on Wednesday in Abuja, said the proliferation of GMOs in the country is worrisome and should be outlawed in the country.
The Programme Manager of Health of the Mother Earth Foundation (HOMEF) Joyce Brown lamented that the Nigeria Biosafety Management Agency (NBMA) is yet to conduct any clinical trials on the GMOs being brought into the country, claiming that what is seen on their website is the applications for bringing in GMOs into the country with no assessments report to actually certify that the GMOs are safe.
She said the country does not need GMOs to solve it’s food insecurity, insisting that food insecurity is caused by poverty, insecurity, inequality among others, noting that instead of resorting to GMOs, the country should rather addressed the problems.
She however advised that looking at the country’s agricultural landscape, a sustainable approach such as agroecology should be adopted to boost food production and not GMOs
On his part, a renowned teacher and agricultural consultant, Prof Johnson Ekpere said that the previous government ratified GMO without understanding the basic precepts that guide GMO which is the Cartegena Protocol on Biosafety
He stressed that the government must ensure that the basic tenets that guide this protocol is understood by those implementing the law for successful adoption and integration.
He also called on the government to set up a biosafety research facility that will help them understand what they are doing and take drastic risk assessment of our biotechnology
The Deputy Director of Center for Food Safety and Agricultural Research, Prof. Qrisstuberg Amua stated that NBMA should be a biosafety regulatory agency not a management agency, insisting that the misapplication of their names has translated them into a promoter of foreign technology that are at the detriment of Nigerians
He however warned that that the unregulated biosafety research can exercebate biosafety challenges which is what is currently manifesting in Nigeria as the chemical pesticides used are known disruptors of echo systems.
Another expert, Dr Segun Adebayo called on the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) and the Federal Completion and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC) to rise up their duty by controlling what is being brought into the country saying Nigerians are eating poison.
A farmer Mrs Ejim Nnena insisted that farmers say No to GMO as the adoption of the technology means poverty, serious nutrition crisis among others.
She maintained that if they are given GMO seeds and cannot replant it, it is poverty in disguise adding that if they have to spray chemicals to enable the seed germinate properly that means farmers are being pushed out of the field into slavery..
She said what farmers are asking for is adequate security on the farms, extension workers to guide the, mapped out areas for farm activities, provide seed banks
