The plant biotechnology flight: is Africa on board?

The development of plant biotechnologies has been very rapid in recent times, especially in the developed countries. The technologies have created a new branch of biotechnology known as molecular farming, where plants are engineered to produce pharmaceutical and technical proteins in large quantities. An evaluation of the status of plant biotechnology development in Africa revealed that majority of the countries that are involved in biotech activities are still at the level of tissue culture applications. This calls for urgent and sincere commitments on the part of the various stakeholders in Africa, especially the governments, to the development of biotechnology capacity.