A talk by agriculture bio-technology scientists starts tonight at 7:30 p.m. at the Lihue Neighborhood Center, which is located in Lihu’e’s Isenberg Tract on the mauka side of Kuhio Highway. The speakers are Dr. Martina Newell McGloughlin, director of the
A talk by agriculture bio-technology scientists starts tonight at 7:30 p.m. at the Lihue Neighborhood Center, which is located in Lihu’e’s Isenberg Tract on the mauka side of Kuhio Highway.
The speakers are Dr. Martina Newell McGloughlin, director of the University of California Biotechnology Research and Education Program, and Dr. Richard Manshardt, a professor with the University of Hawai’i, College of Tropical Agriculture and Human Resources in Manoa.
McGloughlin is a plant pathology professor at University of California, Davis and an expert on current regulatory policy regarding planting of genetically engineered crops.
She is familiar with United States and international studies on the safety of genetically engineered foods, and serves on committees that are developing policy regarding the regulation, reviewing environmental concerns, and developing food safety testing procedures.
Manshardt was a leader in the development of genetically engineered papaya plants for the Hawai’i papaya industry that are resistance to papaya ringspot virus.
He is knowledgeable of new food safety studies that have been done for import approval of genetically engineered papaya fruit by Canada and Japan .
Manshardt plans to address concerns of organic growers regarding the planting of genetically-engineered papayas. He will talk also talk about the papaya ringspot virus, and the devastating effect the plant disease had on the papaya industry on the Big Island, plus the development of the genetically engineered papaya in response to the disease.
The talk on current, science-based agriculture biotechnology is sponsored by the Honolulu-based non-profit Hawaii Agriculture Research Center and the Hawaii Farm Bureau Federation.
