Presented at the workshop "Moving Africa Towards a Knowledge based Bio-economy: How can Sweden assist?" organised by the SIANI Bio-economy Expert Group. More at: http://www.siani.se/news/siani-bioeconomy-expert-group-business

2. The Green Revolution
 The first Green Revolution resulted in cereal yields more
than doubling in Western Europe through crop breeding
and agricultural intensification
 Over the same period, yields in Africa remained static.
Production was increased by increasing the area harvested

3. The downsides of the
green revolution….
 Not seen in Africa because not focused on Africa’s
needs
 Associated with environmental degradation through
increased use of agrochemicals and irrigation water
 So – can Africa leapfrog to the “doubly green
revolution” that will develop sustainable
bioeconomies at the same time as boosting output?
 This will need modern bioscience!

4. What is needed?
 Crops with durable disease resistance
 Abiotic stress tolerance to withstand climate change
 Nutrient and water use efficiency
 Crops for industrial use – biofuels, pharmaceuticals,
green chemicals etc
 Livestock with reduced greenhouse gas emissions and
efficient nutrient conversion

5. What bioscience tools do
we have?
 Tissue culture
 Disease free planting material
 Interspecific and intergeneric hybrids with increased
vigour
 Potential for hybrids in crops such as banana and
cassava, promising productivity increases
 Marker assisted selection
 Association of a marker with a particular trait enables
rapid selection of individual plants or animals

6. What bioscience tools do
we have? (2)
 High throughput genotyping and genome-wide selection
 Whole genome sequencing of many crops, including orphan crops
such as pigeon pea, tef, banana, African rice, cassava
 Whole genome sequencing of cows, pigs, chickens, sheep, goats
 Sequencing to determine variation across the whole genome
associated with specific traits
 Potential for simultaneous selection of multiple desirable traits
without having to wait for a plant or animal to reach maturity
….but, needs carefully chosen breeding populations that sample
genetic variation particularly for complex characters – may be a
bottleneck for the orphan crops where there has been a lack of focus
on conventional breeding
…..for animals, need to select those that perform well under
suboptimal conditions in Africa (limited feed, drought, disease, heat
stress)

7. Genetically modified organisms
 Transgenics
 GM crops with herbicide tolerance and insect resistance
 Nutrient enhancement
 Crops with more complex traits in the pipeline (drought
tolerance, nutrient use efficiency, stress tolerance)
 Pharmaceutical production in plants
 Cisgenics/intragenics
 Transfer of DNA between organisms of the same species
 May be subject to less regulation than conventional GMOs

8. Other genetic modifications
 Targeted genome editing
 Site specific genetic modifications
 Directed mutagenesis of specific genes
 Potential for metabolic engineering of specific pathways
 Elimination of allergens, increased disease resistance etc
 May not be regulated as GMOs (still debated)
 Epigenetic modification
 Alteration of gene expression states
 May be transmitted across generations
 Potential to improve clonally propagated crops (eg banana) or
crops with severe germplasm bottlenecks (eg groundnuts)

9. How will this help African agriculture?
 We need to focus research on crops that are important to
Africa
 We need to focus on climate resilience
 Focus on crops for marginal lands

10. What can be done right now
for Africa?
 Develop crops with improved nutrient content
 Develop (first generation) crops with drought tolerance
 Develop disease resistant crops
 Develop (first generation) crops with enhanced nitrogen
use efficiency
 Develop improved multi-use biofuel crops (Jatropha,
sweet sorghum)
 Develop crops for production of high value chemicals
and pharmaceuticals
 Develop oil crops as bio-based alternatives to
petrochemical feedstocks

11. What is in development?
 Semi-dwarf and lodging tolerant tef
 Nutrient enhanced and disease resistant cassava,
banana
 Biofortified and drought tolerant maize
 Disease, insect and striga resistant cowpea
 Orange fleshed sweet potato
 Striga and drought tolerant sorghum
 High sugar and biomass sweet sorghum
 Disease and drought tolerant pearl millet
 Jatropha with reduced seed toxins

12. What can’t we do yet with modern
bioscience?
(but is on the horizon…)
 Improve phosphorus uptake and utilization
 Improve salt and aluminium tolerance
 Develop crops to remove toxic chemicals (phytoextraction)
 Develop crops to withstand unpredictable climate extremes
(heat, cold, drought, waterlogging, altered season length)
 Economically produce a wide range of valuable metabolites
in plants (sweeteners, flavours and fragrances, dyes and
pigments, skin treatments, nutraceuticals etc)

13. How can Sweden help?
Farming systems that
are sustainable and
support economic
development
Bioscience for crop
and livestock
improvement
Improved
food
security
New
products for
a
bioeconomy
Mitigation of
impact on the
environment

14. How can Sweden help to get
bioscience to the African farmer?
 Enable African scientists to use modern bioscience tools
 Support research programmes that reflect African
priorities
 Build public-private partnerships
 Build linkages between scientists, breeders, seed sector,
farmers, industry and consumers to develop an
integrated value chain