Agricultural Biotechnology Support Project (ABSP) I

Agricultural Biotechnology Support Project (ABSP) I was "a USAID-funded project based in the Institute of International Agriculture at the Michigan State University." ABSP, or ABSP I as it is now known, ran from 1991 until 2003. Around that time, USAID launched its successor project, Agricultural Biotechnology Support Project (ABSP) II.


 * "Since 1991 ABSP, in collaboration with other US universities and the private sector, has integrated research, product development and policy/regulatory development to assist developing countries in accessing and generating biotechnology and in establishing a regulatory framework for the adoption of biotech crops."

As of 2002, ABSP focused on biotechnology in plants, and specifically on "Capacity building in: R&D, Intellectual Property Rights (IPR), Technology Transfer and Biosafety" in its partner countries of Costa Rica, Egypt, India, Indonesia, Kenya, Morocco, and South Africa, and its regional partners of East and Central Africa and Southern Africa.

Roots of ABSP: National Research Council Report
In the late 1980s, USAID's Office of Agriculture commissioned the National Research Council's Board on Science and Technology for International Development to "convene an NRC-appointed panel and a group of experts for two days of discussions concerning priorities in plant biotechnology research that could benefit agriculture in developing countries in the relatively near future." The meeting occurred in September 1989, and the resulting report, published in April 1990, was the basis for ABSP I. The agenda and participant list for the two-day meeting were drawn up by Michael Dow of the BOSTID staff, Joel I. Cohen of USAID's Bureau for Science and Technology, and Robert W. Herdt, who chaired the BOSTID group.

The report recommended that USAID help developing nations put in place Biosafety and Intellectual Property laws, and also help with training and networking for scientists in those countries. About biosafety, the report said:


 * "Developing countries could modify U.S. standards to fit their needs, rather than starting from scratch. But they need objective, authoritative advice. Many countries have difficulty in deciding which products to license and which companies to allow to develop and test products, and as a result, err on the side of caution, so that the use of safe products is not being permitted. This suggests an important role for AID's technical assistance through USAID missions and regional programs."

The technologies it recommended promoting included tissue culture, micropropagation, and genetic engineering. It recommended projects that identify and clone strains of Bt useful in developing countries and develop genetically engineered crops that produce Bt, develop anti-viral strategies (including genetically engineering virus-resistant plants), discover pathogen diagnostic probes, and map the genomes of tropical crops. The report also noted that creating GMOs that can fix their own nitrogen is complex and difficult, but perhaps a project could focus on improving the nitrogen fixation capacity of legumes. Additionally, creating drought and salt tolerant plans was seen as difficult, "but selection of salt-tolerant strains of plants for salinized area by plant breeding may offer useful opportunities."

The two-day meeting began with opening remarks by USAID Director for Agriculture William Furtick, who said, "The new actor is the private sector... We have to reach out to both public- and private-sector scientists. How to bring them together? Here the role of the IARCs [International Agricultural Research Centers] is to serve as a focal point to bring the actors together." He also said in his remarks:


 * "Its [The United States'] emphasis is still on sustainability of agriculture and protection of the environment, using low-input technology. Plant biotechnology is most promising to support sustainability, particularly through disease and pest control, economic benefits of seed technology, low use of pesticides through plant-pest resistance, and diagnostics for identifying pathogens."

David D. Bathrick also gave opening remarks, in which he said that "Now what AID is looking for are not only new research priorities but "new ways of doing business" through linkages with the IARCs and with private sector activities."

During the meeting, USAID officials said they expected about $9 million would be available to fund biotechnology at USAID over the next five years, although more money could come from individual USAID missions and from regional programs. They asked the participants to make a list of priorities.

Participants
The meeting participants included:
 * Chairman: Robert W. Herdt, Director, Agricultural Sciences, Rockefeller Foundation
 * John D. Axtell, USAID Sorghum/Millet Collaborative Research Program. Department of Agronomy, Purdue University.
 * Robert N. Beachy, Washington University in St. Louis
 * Robert H. Burris, University of Wisconsin-Madison
 * Larry Butler, USAID Sorghum/Millet Collaborative Research Support Program, Purdue University
 * John H. Dodds, Tissue Culture Specialist, International Potato Center (CIP)
 * Richard K. Lankow, Director of Product Development, Agri-Diagnostic Associates
 * David MacKenzie, Director, National Biological Impact Assessment Program, USDA
 * Abdul Mujeeb-Kazi, CIMMYT
 * Murray W. Nabors, Director, USAID Tissue Culture for Crops Project, Colorado State University
 * Wellington Otieno, International Centre for Insect Physiology and Ecology
 * James Steadman, USAID Bean/Cowpea Collaborative Research Support Program, University of Nebraska
 * Thira Sutabutra, Research and Development Institute, Kasetsart University, Thailand.
 * Indra K. Vasil, University of Florida
 * J. Trevor Williams, International Board for Plant Genetic Resources, International Fund for Agricultural Research
 * H. Martin Wilson, Garst Seed Co. (Syngenta)

USAID Staff:
 * David D. Bathrick, Director, Office of Agriculture, Bureau for Science and Technology
 * Judith Chambers, AAAS Fellow, Office of Agriculture, Bureau for Science and Technology
 * Eugene R. Chiavaroli, Assistant Administrator, Bureau for Science and Technology
 * Joel I. Cohen, Biotechnology and Genetic Resource Specialist, Office of Agriculture, Bureau for Science and Technology
 * Vincent Cusumano, Office of Agriculture, Bureau for Science and Technology
 * William Furtick, Acting Agency Director, Food and Agriculture, Bureau for Science and Technology
 * Lance Jepson, Agriculture and Natural Resources, Office of Technical Resources, Bureau for Africa
 * Robert Schaffert, Office of Agriculture, Bureau for Science and Technology

National Research Council Staff:
 * Michael Dow, Board on Science and Technology for International Development
 * Jay Davenport, Board on Science and Technology for International Development
 * Maurice Fried, Board on Science and Technology for International Development
 * John Pino, Board on Agriculture

Objectives
The objectives of ABSP are to "establish a policy framework in developing countries that promotes the use and adoption of agricultural biotechnology products," and to "improve marketed crops through strategic research partnerships between the US and Developing Country public and private sectors."

Significance
A 2004 article by Lawrence Kent of the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center calls USAID's biotech work such as ABSP "the best hope" for public funding for R&D for biotechnology for developing countries. This is significant in the context of his greater argument, summarized below:


 * "Agricultural biotechnology offers great potential benefits to farmers in developing countries, but so far only a small handful of genetically modified (GM) crop products have been planted in only a few developing countries. This paper discusses the reasons why more GM crops have not reached farmers in more developing countries. It argues that publicly funded research efforts have largely failed, so far, in developing GM crops adapted to developing country needs, because of inadequate funding and insufficient focus on producing products. It argues that privately created GM technologies-such as Bt maize-have a better chance of reaching farmers in developing countries, but the transfer of such technologies is hampered by high biosafety regulatory costs, high seed regulatory costs, inadequate intellectual property protection, and local concerns about losing export markets. Overcoming these obstacles will require more money and product focus in public sector institutions, expanded efforts to improve regulatory environments, and the nurturing of local farmer constituencies for GM technologies."

Kent notes that Agricultural Biotechnology Support Program (ABSP) began in 1991 "with a core budget of about $6 million and an additional $8.6 million of support from country offices, some of which it invested in projects such as research on transgenic potatoes at Michigan State University and transgenic tomatoes at the International Laboratory for Tropical Agricultural Biotechnology (ILTAB)." He goes on, saying:


 * "However, this program failed to achieve its key objective of "bringing a transgenic product to the stage of commercialization" (Brenner, Sampaio, Sittenfeld, & Thro, 2001, p. vi). The next phase — ABSP-II — is expected to invest more in such product-focused projects; however, its overall research budget is quite limited and probably adequate to fund only a handful of projects, and even those only partially. Fundraising efforts directed at companies and philanthropic foundations have succeeded in some cases, but rarely, and the resulting funds are adequate to cover only small portions of the costs associated with developing transgenic products. The Rockefeller Foundation has been the most generous, but its focus is now on establishing a new institution called the African Agricultural Transfer Foundation (AATF) and less on funding specific R&D projects. In Europe, the political controversy surrounding biotechnology has made it extremely difficult to raise funds to develop transgenic products.

Partner Organizations
Between 1991 and 2002, partner organizations in the United States included:
 * Michigan State University
 * Cornell University
 * Texas A & M University
 * Scripps Research Institute
 * University of Arizona
 * University of Texas at Dallas
 * Ohio State University
 * Virginia Tech
 * UC-Berkeley
 * CABI (Centre for Agricultural Bioscience International)
 * Asgrow (later acquired by Monsanto)
 * Monsanto
 * Garst Seed (Syngenta)
 * DNA Plant Technology (DNAP)
 * Pioneer Hi-Bred (acquired by DuPont during this period)

International partner organizations included:
 * Central Research Institute for Food Crops (CRIFC), Indonesia
 * Agricultural Genetic Engineering and Research Institute (AGERI), Egypt
 * Kenya Agriculture Research Institute (KARI)
 * Agribiotecnologia de Costa Rica
 * Fitotek Unggul, Indonesia
 * DPVCTRF, Morocco
 * ASARECA, East Africa
 * ARC-Roodeplaat, South Africa

Related SourceWatch Articles

 * U.S. Promotion of Ag Biotech in Egypt
 * U.S. Agency for International Development
 * USAID Promotion of Agricultural Biotechnology
 * Agricultural Biotechnology Support Project (ABSP) I
 * Michigan State University Institute of International Agriculture
 * Michigan State University
 * Collaborative Agricultural Biotechnology Initiative (CABIO)
 * Agricultural Biotechnology Support Project (ABSP) II
 * Bt Eggplant
 * Bt Potato
 * Late Blight Resistant Potato
 * Program for Biosafety Systems (PBS)
 * U.S. State Department Promotion of Agricultural Biotechnology
 * U.S. State Department Bureau of Economic, Energy, and Business Affairs
 * Trade Policy and Programs
 * Office of Agriculture, Biotechnology, and Textile Trade Affairs
 * U.S. Department of State Biotechnology Outreach Funds
 * Jack A. Bobo
 * Madelyn E. Spirnak
 * Marcella B. Szymanski
 * GMO Policies by Country

External Resources

 * Johan Brink, "Agricultural Biotechnology Support Project Egypt Project Final Report," October 15, 1995 – September 30, 2002.
 * Johan Brink, "Agricultural Biotechnology Support Project Final Report."
 * Plant biotechnology research for developing countries: report of a panel of the Board on Science and Technology for International Development, National Research Council, Washington, D.C.,National Academy Press, 1990.

External Articles

 * "USAID: Making the world hungry for GM crops," GRAIN, April 25, 2005.
 * Agricultural Biotechnology Support Program, PowerBase.
 * Agricultural Biotechnology Support Program, LobbyWatch.org.