The Food and Agricultural Oranization (FAO) of the United Nations has declared 16 October 2012 as World Food Day, with the theme "Agricultural Cooperatives - Key to Feeding the World".

"In a world, and especially on the African continent, where hunger and malnurtrition are rife, the South African agro-food industry is a shining beacon of hope, contributing immensely to at least a good level of national food security in the country and further abroad into the southern Africa region", says Dr John Purchase, CEO of Agbiz. More»

The CEO of Agbiz, Dr John Purchase, was invited by government to form part of the South African delegation and event at the United Nations' Congress of the Parties meeting on the Cartegena Protocol on Biosafety (CPOB).

The CPOB essentially creates a common framework across countries within which to manage the regulation and control of Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO's) and Living Modified Organisms (LMO's). South Africa is party to the CPOB and as such has established an excellent and responsible regulation framework through which the technological progress of genetic modification is used to the benefit of society as a whole. Government Departments involve, included the Department of Environmental Affairs (DEA), Department of Science and Technology (DST) and the Department of Agriculture Forestry and Fisheries (DAFF), the latter being responsible for the GMO Act.

Dr Hennie Groenewald of Biosafety South Africa, was also part of the delegation and event. The objective of the South African event was to showcase how a developing country such as South Africa, can implement an effective and responsible Biosafety Protocol to manage genetic modification, and to offer assistance to especially African countries on how to adopt and embrace similar technological advances in terms of genetic modification and to manage the concomitant Biosafety Protocol.

Please peruse the presentation of Dr Purchase and the press release of the COP-MOP6 Meeting for further info. For detailed info on the meeting, please visit http://bch.cbd.int/mop6/.

The COP-MOP6 Meeting was also used to present the results of the so-called Seralini-study on the predisposition of lab rats to tumour formation due to being fed on GM maize. The discussion in this event was heated with regulators from most countries expressing their misgivings and calling for independent repeats of the study to verify the results, which are largely disputed. Concern was also expressed as to the lack of sample size and bio-statistical analysis in the study, and the inferences drawn from the acknowledged limited data set. Two highly respected European regulatory bodies also released press statements to counter the claims of the Seralini-study.

The Federal Institute for Risk Assessment (BfR) is a research unit in the Federal Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Consumer Protection (BMELV). It advises the German federal government and the states on issues of food, chemical and product safety. BfR engages in research on topics that are closely related to its assessment tasks and issued a press release. The European Food Safety Authority has similarly dismissed the Seralini-study.