University of Reading, AMIGA partner, represented by Dr Ian McFarlene, was pleased to have recently participated in the World Congress of Agricultural Biotechnology (WCAB), which took place in Dalian, China on the 21st-22nd of September 2012.
The WCAB-2012 event was based on a platform of oral and poster discussion, and was opened with a plenary session focused on agricultural biotechnology and future tendencies. The speakers came from a spectrum of locations and project experiences, providing this event with much useful insight.
The first speech was given by Dr Douglas Wagner, from Dow Agrosciences, who spoke of gene sequencing and genetic variations in maize. Other relevant speakers included Birgit Arnholdt-Achmitt from the University of Evora, Portugal, David Shi Liu from the China Agriculture Guoxin Capital, and Siva Kumpatla from Dow Agrosciences.
The plenary was followed by various parallel sessions over the course of 2 days in which speakers, from universities, research centres and industries, were able to discuss their work related to GMOs, food processing, crop breeding, molecular breeding, biosafety and technology innovation.
Dr McFarlene from the Amiga project participated in the session related to crop development, where he presented his contribution with a paper entitled “Economic consequences of regulatory constraints on transgenic crop cultivation in EU”. This presentation was aimed at explaining the first economic model iteration and discussing with the participants to gather the first comments and feedback within the framework of the AMIGA project.
Many notable developments and advances in the field of Agricultural Biotechnology were presented and discussed throughout the various sessions at this event, showing much promise over ardent issues such as the reduction of environmental risks, and the development of new insecticides, to name only a few.
The participation of the Amiga project in WCAB-2012 thus resulted as a mutually beneficial experience in which the exchange of information and ideas was facilitated. This event hosted a total of 60 participants and other sessions were held on livestock, organics, ecology, biodiversity as well as functional foods.