The president of Argentina, Maurício Macri, scheduled a surprise meeting with agricultural leaders from the country's public and private sectors to discuss issues related to the launch of a genetically modified wheat variety. The attitude contradicted a statement from the Agroindustry Secretariat that this variety would not be released, as it could harm cereal exports. Before the meeting, no one in the private sector knew exactly why the call was being held. But President Macri decided to learn first-hand everything about the case of HB4 wheat, a transgenic crop developed by the national biotechnology company Bioceres for drought tolerance, and the convenience of releasing it or not.
Sources from the eFarmNewsAr.com portal said that President Macri asked many questions and paid attention to each answer. He refrained from issuing a judgment or opinion, but everyone understood that the president wanted to get involved in the case. “It was a rich exchange of ideas,” said the source.
There are two sides to the debate over the approval or not of transgenic wheat, those who want and those who do not want to be the first to launch the variety. According to the portal, President Macri ordered those present to reach a solution that harmonized advances in local science with the commercial flow that preserves wheat exports and markets.
The meeting was attended by the Secretary of Agroindustry, Luis Miguel Etchevehere, the president of the National Institute of Agricultural Technology (INTA), Juan Balbin; the president of Grupo Los Grobo, Gustavo Grobocopatel; the president of Bioceres, Federico Trucco; the president of the wheat milling industry, Diego Cifarelli; the leader of the wheat chain (Argentrigo), David Hughes; and Etchevehere's chief advisor, Santiago del Solar, among others.
Source: agrolink | Author: Leonardo Gottems
