Evaluation of GM Crop Trade Barriers in East African Countries

John Komen and David Wafula wrote a book titled An Evaluation of Trade Barriers to the Adoption of Genetically Modified Crops in the East African Community. The book is based on a literature review of recent studies that analyzed the actual and potential trade implications of GM crop adoption in East African countries.

The authors noted that East African countries like Kenya and Tanzania have implemented precautionary policy decisions on GM crops and have adopted stringent biosafety laws and regulations. Such decisions are likely to inhibit investments on important biotech R&D. Moreover, restrictions in importation of GM crops are affecting food security through price hikes for staple foods and emergency food aid. Thus, they recommended the following:

• The East African countries should weigh all the benefits and risks of adopting GM crops based on sound science and data.
• The governments of the concerned countries should be cautious of the future implications of adopting regulatory frameworks and policy decisions on domestic food security and agricultural commodity trading.
• The countries should strive to ensure that national biosafety frameworks are in line with their trade and economic policies as well as important World Trade Organization (WTO) agreements.