With 70% of its population under 25, Niger has one of the youngest populations in the world. Most of this West African nation’s young people have limited access to technical training, advice on job orientation and inadequate work opportunities. As a result, youth in rural areas migrate to cities and neighboring countries in search of jobs. In its efforts to address the exodus, Government of Niger considers youth employment as one of its fundamental priorities to develop the country and reduce poverty.

A team of researchers led by Professor Anne Osbourn at the John Innes Centre has successfully traced the remaining last steps of the biological pathway that makes oats resist a deadly crop disease, creating opportunities for new ways of building up the defense for wheat and other cereals against the soil-borne root disease. Experiments to establish the avenacin biosynthetic pathway in wheat's genome were conducted to test if it will provide the same resistance to take-all and other diseases

Dr. Evanega's efforts in leadership were recognized, particularly in leading the Alliance, a global initiative involving an international network of science allies. The Alliance has trained 800 individuals from 50 countries to use innovative, progressive tools in communicating about agricultural science. Dr. Evanega led the formation of a global platform that gives opportunities for people to express their support to agricultural technologies.

Although severe hunger has not been a major issue in Europe and Central Asia in the past 20 years, the region is in part facing an increase of moderate food insecurity - understood as irregular access to nutritious and sufficient food -, while also dealing with the widespread rapid growth of obesity, challenging its ability to achieve food security and improved nutrition, as outlined in the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 2.

Developments in regulations of genome-edited plants are rapidly changing and continue to evolve as more countries firm up their regulatory policies. This is according to the Transgenic Research article authored by international biotech experts.The article presents the latest legal and regulatory developments in various jurisdictions including Canada, Argentina, Brazil, the USA, Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, and the Philippines.

Farmers in South Australia (SA) have started sowing genetically modified (GM) crops following the lifting of their 16-year-old ban on GM crops. GM canola and Bt cotton were the first genetically engineered crops approved for growth in SA. Farmers have begun dry-sowing GM canola crops despite below-average rainfall in March and April. They were hoping to save as much moisture as possible before the rainy season starts.

To realize RNA interference (RNAi) therapeutics, it is necessary to deliver therapeutic RNAs (such as small interfering RNA or siRNA) into cell cytoplasm. A major challenge of RNAi therapeutics is the endosomal entrapment of the delivered siRNA. In this study, we developed a family of delivery vehicles called Janus base nanopieces (NPs). They are rod-shaped nanoparticles formed by bundles of Janus base nanotubes (JBNTs) with RNA cargoes incorporated inside via charge interactions

The number of people facing acute food insecurity and needing urgent life and livelihood-saving assistance has hit a five-year high in 2020 in countries beset by food crises, an annual report launched today by the Global Network Against Food Crises (GNAFC) - an international alliance of the UN, the EU, governmental and non-governmental agencies working to tackle food crises together - has found.

A group of Iranian scientists documented the current status of transgenic crops in Iran in their paper published in Scientific Reports. It traces the historical events of the transgenic crop industry in the country as well as an in-depth analysis of how the global biotech crop scenario affects Iran's biotech field. The study aimed to investigate the economic impacts and political scopes of genetically modified (GM) foods, and the policies made by different countries in the world and Iran.

Researchers from Nanjing Agricultural University reported an enhanced and comprehensive genome of the Chinese hazelnut which consists of valuable information for its molecular breeding and genetic improvement. The researchers used de novo whole-genome sequencing and identified 764 genes involved in oil biosynthesis, 96 of which are directly involved in the biosynthesis of oleic acid.