“This book is an attempt to move the discussion away from polarized positions. It aims to contribute to a rational debate on the actual benefits, costs, and risks of existing and future GE crops and technologies for Africa. To accomplish this goal, we introduce a broad set of contributions documenting issues relevant to the current African policy debate. These contributions are representative of the state-of-the-art knowledge about GE biotechnologies in Africa. We also include references to other papers and materials relevant to the debate when appropriate, which may help elucidate important questions for the proper assessment of GE crops and similar technologies in Africa. The following sections aim at setting the stage for the policy debate on GE crops. We briefly present the status of GE crop adoption and capacity in Africa. We then list a number of key potential constraints and describe some of the internal positions on biotechnology.”
