The Philippines
May 6, 2008
Source:
SEAMEO SEARCA
The country's biosafety authorities reaffirmed its science-based
regulations, in a public consultation held on 29 April 2008 at
the Department of Agriculture (DA) headquarters. The Departments
of Agriculture, Science and Technology, Environment and Natural
Resources, Health and the National Committee on Biosafety of the
Philippines jointly prepared the First Philippine Cartagena
Report, in consultation with stakeholders, to support the
national policy of promoting the safe and responsible use of
modern biotechnology.
The biosafety report covered information in the implementation
of the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety (CPB), to which the
Philippines became a party on January 2007. These information
include legal and administrative measures; procedures for
advanced informed agreement and direct use as food, feed or
processing; risk assessment and risk management; unintentional
transboundary movement; illegal transboundary movement;
handling, transport, packaging, and identification; biosafety
clearing house; confidential information; capacity building;
public awareness and participation; non-parties; socio-economic
considerations; and financial mechanism and resources.
Though a new player, the Philippines has already put in place
legal, administrative and other measures that are compliant with
the CPB. To date, the Philippines has approved genetically
modified crops for release to environment and propagation
namely, corn-borer resistant corn, glyphosate-tolerant corn, and
a corn having corn-borer resistance and glyphosate-tolerance.
For genetically modified products for direct use as food, feed,
or for processing, a total of 48 approvals/permit have been
granted.
The Bureau of Plant Industry of the DA also explained the
sampling procedures and rigid GMO-testing done for unapproved
events in the current shipment of rice from the USA. The results
showed negative presence of unapproved events. Greenpeace
Southeast Asia Sustainable Agriculture campaigner Daniel Ocampo
admitted that their samples did not come from the shipment that
was tested by the BPI.
BPI director Joel Rudinas, on the other hand, encouraged
stakeholders to support the implementation of the regulations in
their respective domains. Should there be perceived
implementation gaps, he requested that official reports be
transmitted to their office for appropriate action. He also
invited stakeholders to possible collaborative activities in
order to further promote transparency in biosafety-decision
making.
The consultation elicited valuable inputs from stakeholders
coming from the academe, research and development agencies,
non-government organizations which included Greenpeace, Third
World Network, Earthsavers, Philippine Council for Sustainable
Development, Philippine Seed Industry Association, Crop Life
Philippines, Biotechnology Coalition of the Philippines, and
private sectors - a positive indication of an assured
multi-sectoral participation in biosafety initiatives. |
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