The Dean, Faculty of Science at the university of Abuja, Professor Dankishiya Salihu has called on Nigerians to embrace new Agricultural technology such as the Genetically modified Organisms, GMO, to improve food production and sustain food security in the country.
Professor Salihu stated this at an interactive session on GMO’s organized by the Department of Botany, University of Abuja.
Professor Salihu spoke on the need to engage stakeholders to create more awareness on GMOs.
According to him, the world population was increasing at an alarming rate thereby creating more food insecurity, hence the need to embrace the GMO technology for food sufficiency.
“Nigeria with over 200 million population, the Agricultural production now cannot sustain the population, so there is the need for Agricultural Technology to improve the yield of what we have. our traditional seeds cannot longer sustain us because we have destroyed our soil through environmental degradation.”
Another Senior Lecturer in the Department of Botany, Faculty of Science, University of Abuja, Dr Liadi Tella, who spoke on “the myths of GMO’s”, described GMO seeds as the best in pest control, high crop yield and reduced post-harvest losses.
“In 2015, Nigeria cowpea was returned to the country because of high level of pesticide. Tela-maize (a GMO seed) was multiplied at University of Abuja a year ago and planted alongside some other maize seeds imported from US, when pests attacked other plans the Tela-maize was not affected and it also produced high yield.”
Two students who participated in the session Khairat Yahaya and Praise Anyanwu, said they would use the knowledge gained at the session to conduct more research on GMO’s and lead the cause for Nigeria to attain food security through the use of new agricultural technologies.
RN
