Sense about Science EU was launched during the EuroScience Open Forum (ESOF) conference in Manchester on July 26, 2016. Sense about Science is a London-based group that seeks to increase public understanding of science and promote evidence-based policy. The group has been active in implementing campaigns that call for open discussion about evidence, free from intimidation, hysteria, and political pressure.

Leaders of two United Nations agencies fighting hunger worldwide have applauded new legislation in the United States aimed at strengthening global food assistance programs in the years ahead. The UN World Food Programme (WFP) and the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) praised U.S. President Barack Obama for his 20 July signing of the Global Food Security Act (GFSA), after the bill was passed by the U.S. Congress on 6 July with remarkably broad support.
 

While officially opening the 24^th edition of the Annual National Agricultural and Trade Show on July 14, 2016, President Yoweri Museveni analyzed what confuses Ugandans about GM technology, which involves transferring genes from one plant into another plant of economic interest,  and to impart better qualities in the crop. He further called upon parliament to pass the National Biotechnology and Biosafety Bill into law to allow Ugandan farmers gain access to GM crops.

Researchers from Purdue University investigated the global economic and greenhouse gas (GHG) emission impacts of GM crops by modeling two counterfactual scenarios and assessing them apart and in combination. The first scenario explored the effect of global GMO ban, while the second one modelled the effect of increased GMO penetration with specific focus on the impact on price, welfare, and GHG emissions linked to GM technologies.

A staggering 95% of people infected with hepatitis B or C around the world do not know they are infected. One reason for this is that people can live without symptoms for many years. When they find out they have hepatitis, it is often too late for treatment to be fully effective. As a result, liver damage becomes cirrhosis or liver cancer.

Agriculture officials and technicians from the Southern Tagalog Region recently received seeds of tungro-resistant rice varieties (photo) developed at the world’s leading rice research center. The seeds were handed over during their visit to the the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI). The officials were from the Regional Crop Protection Center (RCPC IV-A) of the Department of Agriculture (DA) and field technicians represented Liliw and Magdalena municipalities in Laguna province.
 

Thale cress (Arabidopsis thaliana) is a favored research subject for plant science. Much of today's knowledge about the inner workings of plants comes from studies in this unimposing, but globally distributed weed. In a major milestone, the "1001 Genome Project", led by Detlef Weigel from the Max Planck Institute for Developmental Biology in Tübingen, Germany and Magnus Nordborg from the Gregor Mendel Institute of Molecular Plant Biology in Vienna, Austria, has recently completed the genome sequences from 1,135 individuals collected all over the world.

Scientists from the University of Würzburg in Germany have examined how plants regulate their salt intake. Salt consists of the cation sodium and the anion chloride. Higher doses of chloride in saline soils have toxic effects on plant development. However, plants need the anion nitrate as a nitrogen source to build proteins and multiply their DNA. Würzburg plant scientists Dietmar Geiger and Rainer Hedrich studied whether and how plants are capable of distinguishing between the nutrient nitrate and the harmful chloride.

American farmers, producers, and other agri-business stakeholders welcomed the passage of the National Bioengineered Food Disclosure Standard by the House of Representatives. The legislation is expected to provide a transparent and uniform national food labeling standard. The bill now goes to President Barack Obama to be signed and passed into a law.

Governments must do much more to provide the enabling conditions required for indigenous peoples, local communities, smallholders and their organizations to restore degraded landscapes and achieve climate change mitigation and adaptation in practice, according to FAO.