Ethiopia, after adopting a law that allowed experimenting
with the transgenic Bt cotton in laboratory and fields, has entered the final stage of
field trials after four years of experiment with four different samples of this
cotton variety taken from India and Sudan. It plans to supply transgenic cotton
seed varieties to the global market in the long run.
According to the Ethiopian Institute of
Agricultural Research (EIAR), the field trials show that Bt cotton could
reverse the influence of insects that greatly affect crop productivity in thecountry. Results from the field trials indicate that
Ethiopia will have a Bt cotton variety in its farmlands soon, an Ethiopian
press agency reported recently.
A workshop on Bt cotton was recently organized in
Addis Abba that was attended by representatives from Sudan, Burkina Faso, South
Africa, India, Australia and the United. Attendee Sanjay K. Gupta, president of
Hyderabad-based JK Agri Genetics Ltd., which has invested at the Hawassa
Industrial Park, said his company would open a new cotton factory there and
make huge investments in the country.
The expansion of the textile manufacturing industries and industrial parks In Ethiopia
has shown a rising demand for cotton. EIAR feels the country is on the right
track to commercialise Bt cotton. EIAR
deputy director Adugna Wakjira said that to transform the nation''s economy
based on agriculture to an industrialised one, textile and garment sectors have
been given priority. At the end of the second growth and transformation plan
years (GTP-II), there is a plan to generate about $1 billion from this sector.
Source: Allafrica.com Thursday, 19 October 2017