Isaac Ongu
Viewpoint: What are the barriers limiting Africa from adopting genetically engineered and hybrid-improved seeds?
Over the last 15 years, development organizations including USAID, the UK’s DFID, and most prominently the Gates Foundation, have invested millions ...
GM cassava research progresses in Uganda
Ugandan researchers are requesting permission to create permanent demonstration gardens of the improved crops ...
Uganda’s GMO bill could become law without President’s assent
After more than a decade of deliberations, a bill that governs the use of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) in Uganda ...
Young Ugandan biotech advocates push back against scare tactics of European and American-funded anti-GMO African environmental activists
While many of his classmates worried, Jonan decided to work in defense of biotechnology ...
Kenya, Ethiopia show neighboring Uganda how to revive its dying cotton industry with pest-tolerant technology
Cotton, once a cash cow in Uganda where growers aspired to outcompete each other in the acreage covered and income ...
Potential of GMOs to combat crop diseases converting skeptical Ugandan politicians
Ugandan banana breeders at Kawanda have improved local banana varieties to resist the devastating banana bacterial wilt. ... Potato breeders ...
Viewpoint: Organic campaigners in Uganda use ‘scare tactics’ to keep GMO crops from farmers
The organics are marketed as “sustainable agriculture”, “agro-ecology farming”, and “farming God’s way”. Organic products are branded natural, organic, safe, ...
Ugandan farmers now wonder if they will ever get access to GMO crops
Disease-resistant bananas, drought-resistant corn and other GMO crops developed by Ugandan scientists could help farmers increase yields, reduce pesticide use ...
Blight-resistant GMO potatoes could reduce pesticide use in Uganda
Uganda is steadily progressing towards having a potato that will not require chemical spraying. ... According to Dr Alex Barekye, ...
South African saga: Anti-GMO activist groups’ disinformation campaign against new disease-resistant corn
South Africa's corn is already more than 90 percent GMO. An application to introduce an improved, disease-fighting variety has revved ...
Uganda becomes newest country to approve growing of GMO, gene-edited crops
Uganda’s Parliament voted the long-awaited National Biosafety Act of 2017 into law ... ending years of governmental debate over whether ...
Uganda on track to pass ‘biotech bill’ that should pave way for GMO crop commercialization
Uganda’s long-awaited national Biotechnology and Biosafety Bill was delayed again yesterday, but is likely to be passed next Tuesday [Oct ...
Ugandan journalist: How do you report on crop biotechnology when critics spread misinformation?
Genetic engineering could help Uganda combat some of its toughest food security challenges. But anti-GMO activists' misinformation campaigns are standing ...
Hidden hunger: How anti-GMO activists are blocking humanitarian biofortification in Africa and Asia
Many crops grown in the developing world are deficient in nutritional qualities--which makes biofortification critical if we hope to improve ...
Does Uganda need GMOs? Scientists look to gene editing to spur innovation
Even as scientists in Uganda and other African countries aggressively push for approvals of new disease-fighting GMO crops, the focus ...
Uganda: From scorching drought to ravaging worms, poor pay the price for missing out on a biotech solution
The food and famine crisis is finally bringing to a head the clash between anti-GMO activists, mostly European based, and ...
Shifting political climate in Uganda may block greenlighting of GMOs
The Ugandan Parliament will resume debate on the stalled Biotechnology and Biosafety Bill when lawmakers return from recess later this ...
Banana wilt, GMOs and Food Evolution: Behind the scenes in Uganda profiling desperate plight of poor farmers
Despite claims by anti-GMO activists who say crop biotechnology mostly benefits big corporations, African farmers and poor people are the ...
Uganda’s science march reveals love, frustration of young scientists
Student scientists join global march in support of science, offer their thoughts on where things stand in Uganda ...
How ‘human bees’, biotechnologists and Gates Foundation are rescuing the African cassava staple
Neither conventional breeding nor genetic engineering alone can solve the viruses threatening Africa's key crop. Add some Gates' funding and ...
How anti-modern farming agroecology NGOs spread GMO misinformation in Africa
Europe and US-funded NGOs are spreading scare stories about GMO crops. Cornell Alliance for Science and other groups are trying ...
Biotechnology could remove dirty feet from Uganda’s beloved beer
Ugandans make beer by squishing banana's with their feet. But biotech may be able to offer a better way that ...
Tanzanian women battle virus-fighting “liberator” cassava but challenges loom
With the introduction of GMO crops still stalled in Tanzania, farmers and scientists are pressing ahead with alternative advanced farming ...
D-Day approaches for Uganda’s Biosafety law, which could pave way for GMO crops
Ugandan scientists allied with farmers and students clash with anti-GMO activists over long-delayed biosafety bill that could lead to introduction ...
View from Uganda: Anti-GMO critics smear Cornell, African science communicators
Cornell Alliance for Science has come under attack for reportedly promoting GMOs with dishonest, industry driven messages. But what is ...
Why Iowa State ‘fortified’ GM banana trials are vital to Uganda
Despite protests, many Ugandans could benefit from Iowa State research into 'golden banana.' ...
Uganda’s President Museveni endorses GMOs, tipping scales in reluctant parliament
Talking directly to members of the Ugandan Parliament and several farmers who continue to suffer the burden of banana bacterial ...
‘Know GMO’ documentary, filming in Africa, challenges anti-GM scare campaign
Documentary filmmakers travel to Uganda with hopes of bringing better understanding based on facts, evidence and science to the greater ...