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{
    "id": 202064,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/202064/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 356,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Mr. Sungu",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 324,
        "legal_name": "Gor Eric Sungu",
        "slug": "gor-sungu"
    },
    "content": "Thank you, Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir. From the outset, I want to congratulate the Minister for finally bringing this Bill to the Floor of the House. On many occasions, we have sat at various fora discussing the question of biosafety. The questions of health of our citizens and use of technology to ensure that we solve some of our problems are very important and preeminent in our times. It is important and incumbent upon the current Parliament to ensure that this Bill is properly debated, so that we can enact it into law and provide guidelines on how this Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs) can be dealt with. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, in the Memorandum of Objects and Reasons the Minister says that: \"This Bill lays down a framework on how activities related to Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs) are to be dealt with. To implement this policy, the Ministry has formulated the Biosafety Bill, 2007, which it intends to be the legal framework governing activities related to GMOs. This Bill seeks to domesticate the provisions 4284 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES October 2, 2007 of the Cartagena Protocol, one of the protocols constituted under the Convention on Biological Diversity to which Kenya is a signatory.\" That was in the year 2003. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I for one have pushed for a Bill on the question of tobacco use and on that occasion also the Government had ratified the protocol called the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) under the auspices of the World Health Organisation (WHO). Therefore, when a country through the Cabinet ratifies a protocol, then it means that it is necessary to domesticate it. This can only be done in Parliament by it enacting laws that can ensure that the provisions of such protocols can be observed in Kenya."
}