ICAR Working Session

Currently, over 30 Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) institutes have active research programs using genetically engineered (GE) plants, covering over 80 species. Because ICAR is committed to compliance with biosafety regulations concerned with GE organisms, it has partnered with the South Asia Biosafety Program, managed by the Agriculture & Food Systems Institute, to initiate a series of biosafety capacity building activities across the institutions for research programs engaged in the development of GE plants. The first major activity has been a pilot program in ten ICAR institutions actively working to develop new GE plants. Two individuals were selected from each of the ICAR institutions to become Institutional Biosafety Officers (IBOs). After their initial training, the IBOs will be working together to create all the materials necessary for a functioning institutional biosafety program, including standard operating procedures, staff training materials, and processes for facility biosafety audits.

An interactive meeting on biosafety was organized on February 18, 2016 at the ICAR-Indian Institute of Oilseeds Research, Hyderabad, for the benefit of scientists, students and research staff of the institute as part of the ICAR Biosafety Program.