Goals of the Project:
1.Launching of the USAID project will speed up adoption of biosafety rules by the appropriate authority.
2.Introduction of biosafety rules will pave the way to initiate both basic and applied activity in research
institutes dealing with plants and general universities.
3.With biosafety laws in force, BRRI ( Bangladesh Rice Research Institute) and IRRI may launch a joint program with assistance from USA scientists to produce Bangladesh version of Golden Rice through hybridization and selection.
4.Likewise Bangladesh version of virus resistant papaya may have to be produced through joint efforts of
Cornell and BARI scientists, in case transgenic papaya population raised from Hawaiian source do not do
well in Bangladesh and Indian climate.
5.Oral vaccines as are now available in exotic potato variety may be passed on to standard Bangladesh and
Indian potato varieties and tried in Bangladesh and India for immunization against pernicious diarrhea.
6.A cadre of scientists with specialty in biosafety rules and laws will be created as a direct benefit of the
project.
7.Under graduate program at least a dozen of students from Bangladesh will have an opportunity to do their
M.S. and Ph.D. in US universities on topics outlined above. So that scientists are not lost to the country
after their completion of M.S. or Ph.D., graduate work may be split between Bangladesh- and USA
universities. This arrangement will stop brain drain.
