SciDev.Net

FAO

A laboratory devoted to improving bananas through biotechnology will open today in Kampala, Uganda.

The facility should help to safeguard Uganda's staple crop, which is increasingly threatened by pests and disease. It will also put the nation on the road to genetic modification — a technique that has largely been focused on cash crops in wealthier nations.

"Uganda doesn't endure famine  — to a great extent that is because of bananas," says Joseph Mukiibi, former director of Uganda's National Agricultural Research Organisation, where the new lab is based.

Link to full Nature Science Update article