Source:
SciDevNet
David Njagi and Christina Scott
The Kenyan
government plans to pass its proposed
biosafety bill next month (December)
following years of delays.
Mary Kamau,
a director from the research and technical
training division of the Kenyan Ministry of
Agriculture, said the Biosafety Bill 2008
should be passed before the Kenyan
parliament breaks up for Christmas. After
that it will go to President Mwai Kibaki for
approval or rejection.
If the bill
is not passed by the time government breaks
up on December 11, it cannot be passed
before March 2009, when parliament
reconvenes.
The legislation will enable a National
Biosafety Authority to oversee rapid
developments in modern biotechnology and
provide the legal framework to allow the
cultivation of genetically modified crops.
But a group
of 53 civil society organisations, including
the US-based Worldwatch Institute and
UK-based GAIA Foundation, are opposing the
legislation with an online petition and
protest marches.
They claim
that genetically modified plants and animals
might infiltrate indigenous farming and
cause diseases in humans, and that patents
and licensing fees could make small
independent farmers dependent on
international agri-businesses.
Kenya's
government spokesman Alfred Mutua dismissed
the online petition last month (18 October),
saying that the bill will help shield local
agriculture from potentially negative
effects of new biotechnology.
"The
government has been very clear in terms
of our need for food sustainability but also
in terms of protecting our farmers," Mutua
told SciDev.Net.
The bill
has been in the planning stages for four
years (see
Will Kenya's Biosafety Bill of 2005 ever
become law).
The 2008
bill, which is similar to one proposed in
2007, has been considered this year by two
parliamentary committees — agriculture, land
and natural resources as well as education,
science and technology.
Kenya's
minister for agriculture, William Ruto, said
the latest delays (last month) were because
of efforts to pass Kenya's new power-sharing
constitution before the end of the year.
Scientists,
agricultural organisations and policymakers
have tried to introduce and regulate
genetically modified organisms in Kenya
since 1998. When the Cartagena Protocol on
Biosafety was opened for signatures in 2000,
Kenya was the first country to sign up.
In 2007,
member of parliament Davis Nakitare proposed
legislation to ban genetically modified
organisms in Kenya, but it was rejected by
the government.
The Kenya
Agricultural Research Institute has been
carrying out laboratory and field research
on transgenic maize, sweet potato, cassava
and cotton crops as well as the rinderpest
vaccine while waiting for the legislation to
be passed.