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Author: Matthew A. Schnurr
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
ISBN: 0228000459
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 302
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Book Description
As development donors invest hundreds of millions of dollars into improved crops designed to alleviate poverty and hunger, Africa has emerged as the final frontier in the global debate over agricultural biotechnology. The first data-driven assessment of the ecological, social, and political factors that shape our understanding of genetic modification, Africa's Gene Revolution surveys twenty years of efforts to use genomics-based breeding to enhance yields and livelihoods for African farmers. Matthew Schnurr considers the full range of biotechnologies currently in commercial use and those in development - including hybrids, marker-assisted breeding, tissue culture, and genetic engineering. Drawing on interviews with biotechnology experts alongside research conducted with more than two hundred farmers across eastern, western, and southern Africa, Schnurr reveals a profound incongruity between the optimistic rhetoric that accompanies genetic modification technology and the realities of the smallholder farmers who are its intended beneficiaries. Through the lens of political ecology, this book demonstrates that the current emphasis on improved seeds discounts the geographic, social, ecological, and economic contexts in which the producers of these crops operate. Bringing the voices of farmers to the foreground of this polarizing debate, Africa's Gene Revolution contends that meaningful change will come from a reconfiguration not only of the plant's genome, but of the entire agricultural system.
Author: Matthew A. Schnurr
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
ISBN: 0228000459
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 302
Get Book Here
Book Description
As development donors invest hundreds of millions of dollars into improved crops designed to alleviate poverty and hunger, Africa has emerged as the final frontier in the global debate over agricultural biotechnology. The first data-driven assessment of the ecological, social, and political factors that shape our understanding of genetic modification, Africa's Gene Revolution surveys twenty years of efforts to use genomics-based breeding to enhance yields and livelihoods for African farmers. Matthew Schnurr considers the full range of biotechnologies currently in commercial use and those in development - including hybrids, marker-assisted breeding, tissue culture, and genetic engineering. Drawing on interviews with biotechnology experts alongside research conducted with more than two hundred farmers across eastern, western, and southern Africa, Schnurr reveals a profound incongruity between the optimistic rhetoric that accompanies genetic modification technology and the realities of the smallholder farmers who are its intended beneficiaries. Through the lens of political ecology, this book demonstrates that the current emphasis on improved seeds discounts the geographic, social, ecological, and economic contexts in which the producers of these crops operate. Bringing the voices of farmers to the foreground of this polarizing debate, Africa's Gene Revolution contends that meaningful change will come from a reconfiguration not only of the plant's genome, but of the entire agricultural system.
Author: B. Oyelaran-Oyeyinka
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 0230277993
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 255
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Book Description
Using the concept of innovation capacity, this book, using recent field data from countries in Asia and Africa, competently demonstrates how biotechnology can contribute to sustainable economic development. The approach articulates the imperative for developing countries to build up specific capabilities backed up by policies and institutions.
Author: Jennifer Thomson
Publisher: CSIRO PUBLISHING
ISBN: 1486312667
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 209
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Book Description
Attitudes to GM crops continue to generate tension, even though they have been grown commercially for over 20 years. Negative sentiment towards their development limits their adoption in Western countries, despite there being no evidence of harm to human health. These unfounded concerns about genetically modified crops have also inhibited uptake in many countries throughout Africa and Asia, having a major impact on agricultural productivity and preventing the widespread cultivation of potentially life-saving crops. GM Crops and the Global Divide traces the historical importance that European attitudes to past colonial influences, aid, trade and educational involvement have had on African leaders and their people. The detrimental impact that these attitudes have on agricultural productivity and food security continues to be of growing importance, especially in light of climate change, drought and the potential rise in sea levels – the effects of which could be mitigated by the cultivation of GM and gene-edited crops. Following on from her previous books Genes for Africa, GM Crops: The Impact and the Potential and Food for Africa, Jennifer Thomson unravels the reasons behind these negative attitudes towards GM crop production. By addressing the detrimental effects that anti-GM opinions have on nutrition security in developing countries and providing a clear account of the science to counter these attitudes, she hopes to highlight and ultimately bridge this global divide.
Author: Felicia Wu
Publisher: Rand Corporation
ISBN: 0833040510
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 115
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Book Description
The world is now on the cusp of a new agricultural revolution, the so-called Gene Revolution, in which genetically modified (GM) crops are tailored to address chronic agricultural problems in certain regions of the world. This monograph report investigates the circumstances and processes that can induce and sustain this new agricultural revolution. The authors compare the Green Revolution of the 20th century with the GM crop movement to assess the agricultural, technological, sociological, and political differences between the two movements.
Author: National Research Council
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309176891
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 405
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Book Description
Scenes of starvation have drawn the world's attention to Africa's agricultural and environmental crisis. Some observers question whether this continent can ever hope to feed its growing population. Yet there is an overlooked food resource in sub-Saharan Africa that has vast potential: native food plants. When experts were asked to nominate African food plants for inclusion in a new book, a list of 30 species grew quickly to hundreds. All in all, Africa has more than 2,000 native grains and fruitsâ€""lost" species due for rediscovery and exploitation. This volume focuses on native cereals, including: African rice, reserved until recently as a luxury food for religious rituals. Finger millet, neglected internationally although it is a staple for millions. Fonio (acha), probably the oldest African cereal and sometimes called "hungry rice." Pearl millet, a widely used grain that still holds great untapped potential. Sorghum, with prospects for making the twenty-first century the "century of sorghum." Tef, in many ways ideal but only now enjoying budding commercial production. Other cultivated and wild grains. This readable and engaging book dispels myths, often based on Western bias, about the nutritional value, flavor, and yield of these African grains. Designed as a tool for economic development, the volume is organized with increasing levels of detail to meet the needs of both lay and professional readers. The authors present the available information on where and how each grain is grown, harvested, and processed, and they list its benefits and limitations as a food source. The authors describe "next steps" for increasing the use of each grain, outline research needs, and address issues in building commercial production. Sidebars cover such interesting points as the potential use of gene mapping and other "high-tech" agricultural techniques on these grains. This fact-filled volume will be of great interest to agricultural experts, entrepreneurs, researchers, and individuals concerned about restoring food production, environmental health, and economic opportunity in sub-Saharan Africa. Selection, Newbridge Garden Book Club
Author: Muntaser E. Ibrahim
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1107072026
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 351
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Book Description
A pioneering work that focuses on the unique diversity of African genetics, offering insights into human biology and genetic approaches.
Author: Kent Nnadozie
Publisher: Environmental Law Institute
ISBN: 9781585760688
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 366
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Book Description
Author: Robert L. Paarlberg
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674033477
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 254
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Book Description
Biotechnology.
Author: James Sumberg
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1315284049
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 217
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Book Description
Cover -- Title -- Copyright -- CONTENTS -- List of abbreviations -- List of contributors -- Acknowledgements -- 1 Knowledge politics in development-oriented agronomy -- 2 On the movement of agricultural technologies: packaging, unpacking and situated reconfiguration -- 3 South-South cooperation and agribusiness contestations in irrigated rice: China and Brazil in Ghana -- 4 GM crops 'for Africa': contestation and knowledge politics in the Kenyan biosafety debate -- 5 Systems research in the CGIAR as an arena of struggle: competing discourses on the embedding of research in development -- 6 One step forward, two steps back in farmer knowledge exchange: 'scaling up' as Fordist replication in drag -- 7 When the solution became a problem: strategies in the reform of agricultural extension in Uganda -- 8 Sweet 'success': contesting biofortification strategies to address malnutrition in Tanzania -- 9 Crops in context: negotiating traditional and formal seed institutions -- 10 Laws of the field: rights and justice in development-oriented agronomy -- 11 A golden age for agronomy? -- References -- Index
Author: Sakiko Fukuda-Parr
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1136553843
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 277
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Book Description
Whether or not to embrace GM technologies is a fundamental and politically charged question facing humanity in the 21st century, particularly in light of rapidly growing populations and the unknown future impacts of climate change. The Gene Revolution is the first book to bridge the gap between thenaysayers andcheerleaders and look at the issues and complexities facing developing and transitional countries over decisions about GM in light of the reality of what is happening on the ground. The first part of the volume looks at the rise of GM crops, commercialization and spread of the technology and the different positions of the USA and the European Union on the GM question and the effect of global markets. The second part consists of country perspectives from Argentina, Brazil, China, India and South Africa, which provide insight into the profound challenges these countries face and the hard choices that have to be made. The final part takes the analysis a step further by comparing developing and transitional country experiences, and charts a future course for government policy on GM that supports growth, sustainability and equity for the many billions of people affected worldwide.
