IAR Giant Stride: Commercial
Release of Pod Borer Resistant Cowpea, the First GMO in Nigeria
You can follow this link to read the version of Neptune Prime, an online Newspaper
Monday, 28th January 2019 became
the momentous date in the history of genetic engineering of agricultural
commodities in Nigeria. It was a day that Nigeria emerged triumphant in a global
scientific community as a country capable of using biotechnology to address
food security challenges. The day was certainly a milestone for food scientists
in Nigeria and abroad because of the commercial release of pod Borer Resistant
(PBR) Cowpea. The Federal Government of Nigeria approved the commercial release
of the PBR Cowpea, which was developed by the Institute for Agricultural
Research (IAR), one of the research centers of Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria.
IAR is also among the seventeen National Agricultural Research Institutes under
the auspices of Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (FMARD),
Abuja.
The PBR Cowpea, by this development,
becomes the first genetically modified food crop to be approved in the country.
IAR in partnership with the African Agricultural Technology Foundation (AATF)
commenced the research to address the deadly Maruca Vitrata attacks on beans in
2009. This became necessary when series of efforts to use conventional breeding
methods failed to produce the desired results. Ten years of extensive research
by IAR and her collaborators on genetic engineering is highly commendable
considering the environmental challenges to scientific research in Nigeria. It
is also commendable to the Federal government for the prompt action to
commercially release the product of this tireless intellectual work conducted
over a ten-year period.
As a scientist, I am fully aware that the
environmental challenges to research work in Nigeria involving laboratory and
field experimentations are enormous. The enormity is more pronounced in genetic
improvement of bio-resources that takes ample time, colossal financial
resources and innate intellectual capabilities.
According to CropLife International organization (https://croplife.org/plant-biotechnology/regulatory), The cost of discovery, development and
authorization of a new plant biotechnology trait introduced between 2008 and
2012 in USA was on the average of US$136 million. The time from the initiation
of a discovery project to commercial launch is estimated to be 13.1 years on
average for all the GMO crops. This huge financial resource for GMO research
and development (R&D) in USA is equivalent to N48 billion in Nigerian
currency. In addition to the time for R&D, there are also registration and
regulatory procedures. The time for these stages (registration and regulatory)
was increased in USA from the avaerage of 44.5 months (3.7 years) for a GMO
crop introduced before 2002, to the current estimate of 65.5 months (5.5
years). This is because various activity stages overlap in real time and they
do not reflect the actual duration of the overall R&D process. While that
price tag is significant, so are the losses from pests, diseases and other
issues that these new traits are designed to help farmers combat. For example,
the U.S. Department of Agriculture has estimated corn rootworm causes $1
billion dollars in damage to the U.S. corn crop alone each year. By delivering
traits that can fight these pests, it increases farmers’ productivity. From the
foregoing analysis, it is therefore clear that this seemingly simple event of
releasing the PBR cowpea variety is by no means a mammoth breakthrough by IAR
and in deed by the nation.
The release of the PBR cowpea variety into
the nation’s agricultural seed system was necessitated by two key reasons.
First, the variety successfully passed all regulatory stipulations and international
scientific procedures subjected to GMO for safety and standard. Second, the
Federal government is very desirous of making the nation achieve food security
through use of improved technologies. What are the likely impacts the release
of PBR cowpea variety will achieve in the next few years? What made IAR
scientists and their collaborators achieve this giant feat?
Starting with the last question on
motivation for the scientists to achieve the gargantuan landmark in genetic
engineering. Without mincing words, financial gain to the team or the
Institute, IAR is certainly out of the question because of our lackadaisical
attitude as a nation in financing scientific research. According to Kuriuki,
the director of the African Academy of Sciences’ Alliance, Nairobi, Kenya, “Government
money (in Africa) is spent on development and security, not research and
innovation”. He quoted the World Economic Forum, “Africa produces only 1.1% of
global scientific knowledge. The continent has just 79 scientists per million
of inhabitants compared to countries like Brazil and United States where the
ratio stands at 656 and 4,500, respectively. Worst of all, of those scientists
and engineers who are trained in Africa, most work elsewhere due to the lack of
infrastructure and resources”. Thus, the desire to squarely address the deadly
Maruca Vitrata attacks on cowpea (popularly called beans) was major inspiration
of IAR. At the official public presentation of PBR cowpea, the first ever Nigerian
GMO commercially released for public use, the Executive Director of IAR, Prof.
I. U Abubakar provided cogent reasons for the Institute commitment to the
project. He said “the decision to venture into genetic modification in cowpea
breeding was as a result of massive pest infestation that has over the years
made cowpea farming difficult as farmers get less for their efforts and even
exposed their lives to danger due to chemical spraying to keep the pest away”.
Similarly, the acting Director General, National Biotechnology Development
Agency (NABDA) Prof. Alex Akpa, said that by the approval, Nigeria has
registered her name among the global scientific community as a country capable
of finding solutions to her challenges. “After 10 years of laboratory works and
on-field trials, Nigerian scientists have developed its first genetically
modified food crop, the PBR Cowpea, we are proud to be associated with this
noble development” Akpa said
Elimination of the deadly cowpea
infestation will increase the national average yield of cowpea from 1.5 to 3.5
tons per hectare thereby facilitating the achievement of national food
security. Consequently, the solution will bridge the national deficit of cowpea
demand estimated to be more than 500,000 tons in addition to improvement of the
national productivity while lowering the food importation. Why the choice of
cowpea as the first test crop for R&D of GMO in Nigeria?
Nigeria is recognized globally as the
largest Cowpea producer with making of 61 percent of the African production and
58 percent of the world’s production. Incidentally, Nigeria is also ranked as
the highest consumer of cowpea. As leguminous crop, cowpea is a food crop that
forms the bulk of dishes eaten in the majority of households in Nigeria on a
daily basis. It is highly nutritional
with high supply of energy content to the body. Cowpea has a wide range of
nutritional benefits to the body. A small quantity of cowpea, about 170 grams could
contain as much as 13.22g of protein and more than three times carbohydrates of
35.5g. It is a good source of vegetable protein and can serve as meat to people
who cannot afford animal protein or are vegetarians. Cowpea has protection
ability against colon cancer as well as reduction of blood cholesterol levels
by working as a bulk laxative and bringing down reabsorption of
cholesterol-binding bile acids in the colon. It is rich in essential amino
acids and B vitamins, with a very high content of the very important folate, which
helps prevent neural-tube defects in babies and thus making it one of the
preferred delicacies for pregnant women. Additionally, cowpea contains several
essential minerals like Copper, Iron, Selenium, Calcium, Zinc, Phosphorus,
Potassium and as well as contains little fat, making it suitable for people placed
on a low-fat diet.
Cowpea is dominantly grown by smallholder
farmers and serves as a primary source of protein for both urban rich and rural
poor Nigerians. With serious threat to food insecurity coupled with the results
of the Fifth Multiple Indicators Cluster Survey (MICS5) recently released, the
choice of cowpea for the development of first Nigerian GMO is certainly
dexterous in our national effort to achieve food security. With PBR cowpea, farmers
will no longer need to use toxic chemicals on the production and preservation
of cowpea, yield will increase, and more cowpea will be available for food to
Nigerians and beyond. This is indubitably a highly commendable effort to IAR
and her likable collaborators and supporters. While commending the developers
of the first Nigerian GMO, it must be stated that GMO connotes dreadful fear to
some people. Is GMO safe for human consumption? Is PBR cowpea safe to humanity? (To be continued next week)
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