News brief

China's appetite for cereals exceeds production

An emergency increase of 25 per cent (US$3 billion approx) in its agricultural budget has been made by the Chinese government. This is primarily to raise support prices for wheat and rice, and to improve irrigation infrastructure. The decision indicates mounting concern about China's food security, reflecting a significant decline in production of wheat, rice and maize. With wheat stocks shrinking and prices rising, China has made initial purchases of some 5 million tons in Australia, Canada and the US, which has driven up world prices for wheat.

Demand for all grains is increasing due to population growth of 11 million people each year and rising consumption of cereals and grain-fed livestock products. Last year China's wheat production fell short of consumption by 19 million tons, and, with stocks exhausted, it is predicted that the entire shortfall will have to be met by imports within the next two years. The rice deficit of 20 million tons is more critical since total world rice exports are only 26 million tons.

After peaking at 392 million tons in 1998, China's grain production has fallen in four of the last five years. The drop of 70 million tons to 322 million in 2003 exceeds the total grain production of Canada. The causes for these production declines include loss of irrigation water and fertile land to urban expansion, a shift to higher value crops, and a decline in double-cropping due to loss of family labour to urban migration.
www.earth-policy.org

Biodiversity Treaty to become law

Forty-eight countries have now ratified the first legally binding treaty on biodiversity for food and agriculture. When 12 European countries and the European Community ratified the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture, it triggered the 90-day countdown to 29 June 2004, when the Treaty will become law.

"Years of multilateral negotiations under the auspices of FAO's Intergovernmental Commission on Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture have finally been successful," said Jose Esquinas-Alcazar, Secretary of the Commission. "The Treaty provides a legal framework that will be a key element in ensuring food security now and in the future. The challenge is now to ensure that the Treaty becomes operative in all countries."

credit: Benoit Mertens

Brazil - can't see the trees for the beef

The Amazon rainforest is being flattened by cattle, metaphorically at least. Last year the annual deforestation was almost double that of 1996/7; the reason is that world demand for beef has increased and Brazilian cattlemen have been expanding their herds to take advantage of this global market. Previously, it was the felling for timber that was seen as the main threat to the rainforest, together with clearing land for growing soya beans but now, says the Director General of the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), David Kaimowitz, beef production for export is to blame for Brazil's rapid deforestation. The shocking fact, says Kaimowitz, is that clearances for cattle pasture are doing ten times the damage caused by logging and soya cultivation.

The Brazilian government is trying to prevent ranchers from illegally clearing government land, but it appears to be relatively easy to occupy government land without being prosecuted. Meanwhile, CIFOR has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the government of Indonesia to combat illegal logging in the Centre's host country.

Locust plague threatens NW Africa

The desert locust situation continues to be serious despite control operations, according to FAO, which is calling for donor assistance to prevent a plague from developing. In Morocco, intensive aerial and ground control operations have treated up to 20,000 hectares per day, targeting egg-laying swarms on the southern Atlas Mountains, but export citrus crops remain at risk. More swarms are likely to arrive in Morocco from Algeria, Mauritania and Western Sahara. In Niger, adult densities increased in late March in the southern Air Mountains, where egg laying and hatching were in progress.

Across the continent, desert locust populations unexpectedly shifted earlier this year from the Red Sea coastal plains to northern Sudan and southern Egypt, but numbers declined in Saudi Arabia as swarms moved to north-east Africa. FAO emphasises that if control operations have to slow or cease in north-west Africa due to lack of funds, there will be a dramatic impact on food security in the region, and a desert locust plague could develop by the end of the year.
www.fao.org

Rice research rewarded by World Food Prize

The prestigious World Food Prize, called by some 'agriculture's Nobel', is shared this year by a Chinese and a Sierra Leonean scientist for their "breakthrough scientific achievements which have significantly increased food security for millions of people from Asia to Africa." The award, worth US$250,000, will be presented in October.

Yuan Longping, director general of the China National Rice Research and Development Centre, is rewarded for his work in the 1970s, developing a genetic tool for breeding hybrid rice, known as a 'three-line system'. This led to hybrid varieties with yields 20 percent higher than conventional rice. His approach has been adapted in many countries in Asia and elsewhere.

Monty Jones, a Sierra Leonean rice breeder who worked for many years at WARDA in Cĉte d'Ivoire, developed in the 1990s a rice uniquely adapted for the conditions of West Africa. Known as NERICA (New Rice for Africa), it combines the virtues of African and Asian rice, and could benefit 20 million farmers in West Africa alone. Jones is now Executive Secretary of the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa, based in Accra.
www.worldfoodprize.org/

GM - China, Uganda & UK

The Chinese government is under pressure to allow commercial use of food crops that are genetically modified to withstand insects, diseases and herbicides. Senior Chinese scientists recently released a report urging the government to allow GM planting without delay. Several GM rice varieties have been developed that, in field trials, boost yields and require less chemicals. The scientists claim that the GM rice could have an even greater impact than GM cotton, which is seen by some as a 'miracle crop'. China awarded its first formal safety certificates for the import of GM crops in early March, which may indicate that decision makers are becoming more receptive to GM technologies.

The Ugandan government has also announced that GM foods may be imported, but insists that they should be used "strictly for consumption" and not for cultivation. The National Agricultural Research Organisation, NARO says that the government "recognises the controversial nature of this subject and has therefore decided to proceed with caution, building consensus at all stages." The statement was signed by NARO Director General, George Otim-Nape, and added that "policy decisions should not adversely affect the development of science."

In the UK it is unlikely that GM crops will be grown commercially in the near future, as Bayer CropScience announced withdrawal of its herbicide-resistant maize, Chardon LL at the end of March. Continuing uncertainty over potential responsibility for compensation claims make it unviable, says Bayer.

Tobacco to fight cancer?

Scientists at the University of Cape Town are using genetically modified tobacco as a potential source of vaccines against cancer of the cervix, the biggest cause of cancer deaths in women in Southern Africa. Professor Ed Rybicki and his team at UCT are using tobacco to try and produce a portion of the virus that could be used as a vaccine to confer immunity against cervical cancer. Tobacco has the advantages that it is a well understood plant, and it produces a very large volume of leaf - 20 tonnes of wet leaf per hectare, which offers a potentially large 'factory' in which to develop the 'attenuated' virus. However, like many cancer vaccine developers, the UCT is still far from its goal. www.scienceinafrica.co.za/2004/march/vaccine.htm

Haiti appeal for funds

The recent civil unrest in Haiti has further damaged the country's agricultural sector, already weakened by years of poverty. Many farmers face the risk of being unable to sell their production, to the detriment of consumers and farmers, who need income in order to buy food and to prepare for the next season. About five million of Haiti's eight million population live in rural areas, and the FAO estimates that some three million of these face severe economic difficulties. FAO has launched a US$4million appeal to provide farm inputs, including tools and seeds, and also to improve the food security of the worst affected households.

Orange cauliflower for Vitamin A

A new orange cauliflower with 25 times the vitamin A of standard white cauliflower has been developed at Cornell University, USA. Based on a mutant orange plant found in Canada in 1970, the new cauliflower is the result of 30 years of conventional cross breeding by Michael Dickson, now professor emeritus at the New York State Agricultural Experiment Station in Geneva, NY, with inputs from the University of British Columbia and the UK's National Vegetable Research Station. "White cauliflower lacks the dark green pigments that give broccoli the nutritional advantages that health-conscious people are interested in," says Dickson.

The challenge was to cross the orange with the correct white cauliflower in order to get the colour and the vitamin A content right, and it took eight years to develop the germplasm. When the resulting progeny were tested the orange plants had 54 retinol equivalents (RE) per 100 grams of vitamin A. In comparison, green peas have 64 RE, lima beans 30 RE, sweet corn 28 RE, and cabbage 13 RE.
www.nysaes.cornell.edu/

Agricultural reform in Uganda

A new Bill on agricultural research in Uganda will, if given cabinet approval, put in force the new agricultural policy published last year. The major reforms expected include the creation of an apex National Agricultural Research Council to guide the implementation of a national research agenda by public and private research organizations. The main form of support for research is expected to be through competitive grants. It is also expected that the national research institutes that were previously under the National Agricultural Research Organisation (NARO), will become autonomous. This decentralisation should bring the control and implementation of research closer to farmers. The process has been supported by DFID.

New lentils lift yields

New varieties of lentils, accounting for about 40 per cent of lentil plantings in Bangladesh, have increased national production by an additional 28,000 tons annually. The new varieties, including the outstanding Barimasur-4, were developed in collaboration with ICARDA (International Center for Agricultural Research in Dry Areas), based in Syria. Differences in flowering time between local and higher yielding exotic lentil varieties meant that simple crossing was not possible. Instead, ICARDA scientists used parental material from their gene bank in a hybridisation process that synchronized flowering times, broadened the lentil's genetic base and permitted the introduction of disease-resistant genes.

Lentil yields have increased from less than 1 t/ha from traditional cultivars to up to 2.5 t/ha from Barimasur-4. Lentil is a staple of Bangladesh, providing protein and micronutrients, but the demand has often exceeded production. The collaboration of scientists from the Bangladesh Agricultural Institute (BARI) and ICARDA to develop disease-resistant and high yielding varieties has allowed farmers not only to meet consumer demand, but has contributed to poverty alleviation in rural areas through generating income for farming families' personal and farming needs.
www.icarda.org

Cloned date palms for Iraq

Date palms, a 'god-sent' crop for desert areas, could again bring income to the war-ravaged economy of Iraq. Until a few years ago the world's primary exporter of dates, Iraq needs urgently to replace many millions of palms and rebuild output to benefit farmers and the national economy. Date palms are difficult to propagate, with different varieties (3000 worldwide) each requiring different propagating conditions. But, Iraqi scientists believe that they have overcome this problem with an in vitro cloning system in which tissue growth "buds" are cultured in an artificial medium until seedlings develop. The cloning of plants offers an advantage over traditional use of seeds and cuttings, since it enables large-scale production of genetically uniform plants under laboratory controlled conditions without limitations of seasonality. The cloning system could also be used to conserve Iraqi varieties, which are particularly diverse in northern Iraq.

Farmer videos win communication award

Rice seed sorting and storage are the focus of a series of four training videos that have just won a prestigious award from the International Visual Communication Association. The IVCA award, in the Effective Communication Category, went to CABI Bioscience, which commissioned the videos as part of a seed health project with farmers in Bangladesh. The videos are reported to have already helped change attitudes and behaviour towards seed storage in both men and women. A trainer from agricultural video specialists Countrywise Communications assisted a team from a women's charity and the Rural development Academy in Bogra to shoot the videos in their villages, with funding from the UK's DFID. Already the videos have been broadcast on local TV stations and there are plans to show them in many communities, as well as in neighbouring countries in the region.

1^st May 2004