b'Diego Orzez, a Spanish National Research Council researcherof backward or cumbersome regulatory frameworks, such as at the IBMCP, explains that bentha has been widely used to pro- the one employed by the European Union, could increase the duce a large number of biopharmaceutical products. ZMAPP, anfinal cost of bringing the edible vaccine to the market.antibody mix used to treat Ebola, is produced with bentha. In the case of Mexico, where they are already working on "We have modified bentha\'s genes to improve its ability tothe development of an edible vaccine in tomato plants against produce large amounts of more efficient bio-medicines," he says.COVID-19, local scientists are dealing with difficult times under "When we started the project two years ago, SARS-COV-2 wasthe mandate of a president who has repeatedly declared him-not on the radar. However, since the beginning of the pandemic,self against the use of GM crops and who appointed a sci-several project teams have started working on the productionentist famous for being a staunch GM opponent as director of useful biopharmaceutical products against the pandemic. Inof CONACYT, Mexico\'s government entity that regulates the development are products ranging from reactants to establishnational science budget. fast immunological trials, to molecules that can be used in a"Given the current contingency situation for the COVID-19 program of mass vaccinations. We hope this speeds up the dis- we are experiencing, it will undoubtedly make us rethink the covery of new biopharmaceutical products and, ultimately, con- legislation of the GMOs that apply not only in Mexico but in Latin tributes to the fight against the current and future epidemics." America," says Daniel Garza, a biotechnologist and researcher at the Autonomous University of Nuevo Len in Mexico. "What Regulatory and Biosafety Obstacles is currently happening allows us to rethink whether we are really Legal obstacles, rather than technical and experimental con- capable as countries of being able to face a pandemic of such straints, could delay the arrival of edible vaccines, especially inmagnitude without using the full potential that GMOs offer us for the countries most in need. Although many countries on all con- the development of vaccines, especially for developing countries. tinents have developed GM crops on an experimental level, onlyThe benefits of biotechnology must be shown to society not as 26 nations currently have regulations for their commercial imple- an evil, but as an effective solution to many of the problems that mentation. The Cornell Alliance for Science reports that the usewe currently have in the region.SWCONNECTING THE MOVING Purchase OrderProcessingPARTS Grower Contracts IntegrationSpecialist seed softwareto connect all of the moving parts within your seed productionLaboratory/QA Sales Orderand processing business ProcessingGENERATION SEED MANAGEMENT SOFTWARESeed Processing ShippingSeed Mixing InventoryPhone+1 800 366 2474 Visitprimeticsseed.comEmailprimeticsseed@culturatech.comSEPTEMBER 2020SEEDWORLD.COM /7'