Scientists turn detectives on trail of GM seeds

ISSUE 38: SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2005

The newsletter of United Nations University and its international
network of research and training centres/programmes

Scientists become detectives on trail of modified seeds

Seventeen scientists from nine Latin American and Caribbean countries attended a course on biosafety in agriculture biotechnology and how to detect and segregate genetically modified grains and seeds conducted by UNU Biotechnology for Latin American and the Caribbean (UNU-BIOLAC).

The course, Detection of Agricultural Biotechnology traits in the food chain: Food Biosafety Regulatory Framework, was held at the Institute of Advanced Studies (IDEA) in Caracas, Venezuela.

Course objectives were:

To update and teach professionals from Mexico, Central America, the Carribean region and Venezuela state of the art methodology for detecting agricultural biotechnology traits in grain and genetically modified foods.
To participate in open lectures and discussions carried out by experts on regulatory framework for genetically modified foods.

Participants were from Costa Rica (4) , Mexico (4) , Nicaragua(1), Jamaica(1), Trinidad and Tobago(2), Cuba(2), El Salvador (1), Panama(1) and Venezuela (1).

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