in the middle of the worst drought in 40 years. In the parched north of the country, rivers are drying up and millions of livestock have died from lack of food. Around 4.4 million Kenyans do not have enough to eat and the situation will get worse when this is the case coming rainy season fails like the previous five. “I’ve never seen it that bad. There is nothing on the farms, the drought is too severe,” says Daniel Magondo, a cotton and corn farmer in central Kenya.
The record-breaking drought is forcing Kenya to grapple with a controversial issue: whether the country should grow genetically modified (GM) crops. These are plants that have genes from another organism inserted into their DNA to give them a new trait, such as disease or drought resistance. Although GM crops are and are perfectly safe to eat grown far in the US, Canada, Brazil and India, governments in many parts of the world, including Europe and East Africa, have resisted them.
That was the case in Kenya in 2012, when the cabinet forbidden to import them. The ban stayed in place until 2019, when the government allowed imports of genetically modified cotton engineered to be resistant to a pest called cotton bollworm. And then, in October 2022, the cabinet declared that it would allow farmers to grow pest-resistant GM corn — effectively ending the country’s decades-long ban on GM crops. Since 2015, armyworm moths have devastated autumn corn crops, estimated to be a third of Kenya’s yearly Production.
In a statement released in October, Kenya’s cabinet said GM maize would help improve the country’s food supply and somewhat ease the pressure of the ongoing drought. The government ordered 11 tonnes of pest-resistant genetically modified maize seeds, which are widely used and grown in South Africa tested in Kenya. But then, in February 2023, Kenya’s GMO regulator was barred from releasing the seed after four separate appeals were filed: three in Kenyan courts and one in the East African Court of Justice.
A complaint was filed by the Center for Nutrition and Adequate Living Rights (CEFROHT), a Ugandan environmental non-profit. Others were filed by the Kenya Farmers’ League and Paul Mwangi, a Kenyan lawyer. CEFROHT says the Kenyan decision violated the East African Community Treaty, which obliges East African countries to protect natural resources. Other groups fear that growing GM corn will divert farmers’ focus away from native crops. With planting season fast approaching, the future of GM crops in Kenya is up in the air until the courts make a decision.
Timothy Machi welcomed the withdrawal of the GMO ban. “Something we’ve longed for as a country has finally come true,” says Machi, Kenya’s head of development NGO RePlanet Africa, which works to improve Africa’s food security. When news broke that the move had been challenged in court, Machi helped organize protests in Nairobi and in Kampala, in neighboring Uganda. Around 200 scientists and activists demonstrated in both cities in support of GM crops. They held signs that read “GMOs for Food Security” and advertised with the hashtag “Let Kenya eat”.
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