SciDev.Net

AGRA — a joint initiative of the Rockefeller Foundation and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation — aims to improve African agriculture through new technologies such as improved seeds and fertilisers, better cultivation practices and greater access to credit and marketing channels to help farmers sell their produce.

AGRA's initial investment — US$150m — will be used to develop stronger varieties of African crops, train African scientists and build distribution channels for agricultural inputs such as seeds and fertilisers.

The AGRA website publishes information about the alliance's staff and activities and links to a selection of related documents, news and other information.

Biopact is a non-profit volunteer organisation connecting African and European citizens. It seeks to establish a 'mutually beneficial' biofuel and bioenergy relationship between the two continents. The group is web-based, and provides consulting services for a number of initiatives, including various bioenergy projects in the South.

Some of Biopact's ongoing projects include compiling an 'atlas' of biofuel production for use in estimating production factors, and exploiting Nica fruticans, a potential Nigerian biofuel crop.

The Doyle Foundation has been established in honour of Dr John J Doyle, formerly Deputy Director General of the International Laboratory for Research on Animal Diseases (now part of the International Livestock Research Institute) in Nairobi, Kenya. Dr Doyle died in 1999 at the age of 55, after an outstanding career in international agricultural research and veterinary medicine.

The purpose of the foundation is to advocate and provide support for the role of science in international development, in keeping with Dr Doyle's wide interests and beliefs that science should be directed at solving clearly defined problems.

The Doyle Foundation was officially launched at the University of Glasgow Veterinary School on 30 June 2000.

The Doyle Foundation provides a forum for analysis and advocacy of the role of science in development with special regard to livestock health and the safe applications of modern biotechnology.

Emphasis is given to identifying the research needed to reduce the constraints on production of livestock, especially in Africa, and targeted broadly to livestock health and production and related fields. The Foundation achieves its aims through support for fellowships, sharing information and knowledge and related activities.

ACB is a nongovernmental organisation campaigning for strict biosafety regulations for genetically modified (GM) organisms in Africa.

It provides a useful overview of developments in African biosafety laws and applications of GM technology across the continent. It also hosts a large collection of related briefing documents and research papers and publishes a list of the GM field trial applications submitted in various countries together with the objections lodged against these.