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Bioethics ISSN 0269-9702 (print); 1467-8519 (online) doi:10.1111/bioe.12191

Volume 29 Number 9 2015 pp 604–612

THE ETHICS OF INTRODUCING GMOs INTO SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA:

CONSIDERATIONS FROM THE SUB-SAHARAN AFRICAN THEORY
OF UBUNTU

ANA KOMPARIC

Keywords
Bioethics, ABSTRACT
food ethics, A growing number of countries in sub-Saharan Africa are considering
Ubuntu, legalizing the growth of genetically modified organisms (GMOs). Further-
communitarianism, more, several projects are underway to develop transgenic crops tailored to
sub-Saharan Africa, the region. Given the contentious nature of GMOs and prevalent anti-GMO
genetically modified sentiments in Africa, a robust ethical analysis examining the concerns
organism (GMO), arising from the development, adoption, and regulation of GMOs in sub-
transgenic crop Saharan Africa is warranted.
To date, ethical analyses of GMOs in the global context have drawn
predominantly on Western philosophy, dealing with Africa primarily on a
material level. Yet, a growing number of scholars are articulating and
engaging with ethical theories that draw upon sub-Saharan African value
systems. One such theory, Ubuntu, is a well-studied sub-Saharan African
communitarian morality.
I propose that a robust ethical analysis of Africa’s agricultural future
necessitates engaging with African moral theory. I articulate how Ubuntu
may lead to a novel and constructive understanding of the ethical consid-
erations for introducing GMOs into sub-Saharan Africa. However, rather
than reaching a definitive prescription, which would require significant
engagement with local communities, I consider some of Ubuntu’s broader
implications for conceptualizing risk and engaging with local communities
when evaluating GMOs.
I conclude by reflecting on the implications of using local moral theory in
bioethics by considering how one might negotiate between universalism
and particularism in the global context. Rather than advocating for a form of
ethical relativism, I suggest that local moral theories shed light on salient
ethical considerations that are otherwise overlooked.

INTRODUCTION from farmers’ associations, agribusiness companies,

While technological advances and changes in agricultural
practices during the 1940s to 1960s greatly increased agri-
cultural productivity worldwide, Africa remains the last
region yet to undergo a ‘Green revolution’.1 The annual
African Green Revolution Forum brings together leaders
1
R.L. Paarlberg. Starved for science: how biotechnology is being kept
out of Africa. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press; 2008.
research institutes, non-governmental organisations, and
African governments to discuss the future of Africa’s
food security.2 Marking the African Union’s Year of
Agriculture and Food Security, the Forum’s 2014 agenda
focused on doubling food productivity, halving poverty
2
M. Kinver. Sowing the Seeds for Africa’s Green Revolution.
BBC 5 September. Available at: http://www.bbc.com/news/science
-environment-29079578

Address for correspondence: Ana Komparic, Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Toronto, 144 College Street, Toronto, ON, M5S 3M2,
Canada. Email: ana.komparic@mail.utoronto.ca
Conflict of interest statement: No conflicts declared

© 2015 John Wiley & Sons Ltd

 The Ethics of Introducing GMOs into sub-Saharan Africa
by 2025, and facilitating agriculture-led sustainable
economic growth in sub-Saharan Africa – signalling
increased political interest in reforming African agricul-
tural systems.
Among the range of technologies and approaches
proposed to transform Africa’s agricultural landscape,
genetically modified organisms (GMOs; used inter-
changeably with transgenic crops) have long been touted
as having the potential to increase agricultural yields if
engineered to address the needs of local farmers. After
years of neglecting the unique agricultural features of
sub-Saharan Africa, efforts are underway to engineer
transgenic crops tailored to the region.3 At the same
time, GMOs remain a contentious issue in Africa; while
only four African countries have legalized the growth
of transgenic crops, prevalent anti-GMO sentiments
are often dismissed as a ‘farce’ or ‘as a fear of the
unknown’.4
The controversy over GMOs and the renewed calls to
transform African agricultural systems behoove us to
carefully consider the conditions under which implement-
ing such technologies may be warranted so as to inform
ethical policy formation. This article examines some of
the ethical factors that ought to be considered when
determining whether and how to develop, regulate, and
adopt GMOs in sub-Saharan Africa. Although much has
been written on the ethics of GMOs, little attention has
been paid to the context of the developing world, and
especially sub-Saharan Africa. Yet, the unique social,
cultural, economic, historic, and geographic factors
that characterize sub-Saharan Africa must inform a
contextualized ethical analysis of the possible conditions
under which adopting GMOs may be appropriate in the
region.5 Thus, rather than simply drawing on existing
bioethical analyses of GMOs and engaging with Africa
on a material level (e.g. by citing statistics about agricul-
tural conditions or poverty rates), I examine how criti-
cally engaging with African moral theory shifts the
debate by highlighting relevant implications for adopting
GMOs in sub-Saharan Africa. In particular, I draw upon
recent scholarly articulations of the sub-Saharan African
moral theory of Ubuntu to examine its implications for
3
H. Takeshima. Prospects for Development of Genetically Modified
Cassava in Sub-Saharan Africa. AgBioForum 2010; 13: 63–75; African
Agricultural Technology Foundation (AATF-Africa). Water Efficient
Maize for Africa (WEMA). Nairobi, Kenya. 2013. Available at: http://
wema.aatf-africa.org/ [cited 2012 September 15].
4
M. Tran. GM Crops: African Opposition is a Farce, says Group Led
by Kofi Annan. The Guardian 2013 Sept 5 . Available at: http://
www.theguardian.com/global-development/2013/sep/05/africa-gm
-genetically-modified-crops
5 6
S.R. Benatar. Towards Progress in Resolving Dilemmas in Interna-
tional Research Ethics. J Law Med Ethics 2004; 32: 574–582; R.C. Fox
& J.P. Swazey. Guest Editorial: Ignoring the Social and Cultural
Context of Bioethics is Unacceptable. Camb Q Healthc Ethics 2010;19:
278–281.
© 2015 John Wiley & Sons Ltd
605
GMOs in sub-Saharan Africa, and in particular for shift-
ing the discourses around risk, poverty, and hunger that
permeate the GMO debate. Accordingly, rather than pre-
senting a definitive account of what African ethics is and
what it dictates regarding GMOs, I discuss how critically
engaging with African moral theories is both feasible and
warranted when assessing the ethical implications of
adopting a technology in sub-Saharan Africa. I conclude
with a brief discussion of an approach to reconciling
universalist discourse in bioethics with particularities of
time and place when operating in a global context.
More broadly, this article supports the movement
towards an inclusive bioethics in response to Dawson’s
assertion that bioethics should not be conflated with
medical ethics, and instead should concern a wider array
of ethical issues relating to the creation and maintenance
of the health of living things, including food and agricul-
ture.6 Moreover, in distancing bioethics from medical
ethics, it is possible to critically examine one of the domi-
nant assumptions in contemporary medical ethics and
bioethics – the supremacy of autonomy – and to consider
the interplay between a broader array of ethical princi-
ples, values, and theories that could inform future agri-
cultural policy and practice. Thus, this article engages
critically with dominant approaches in bioethics by
examining African moral theory to inform the under-
standing of GMOs in the context of global health.
BACKGROUND: SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA
AND GMOs
Since their development in the 1980s and 1990s, trans-
genic crops have been touted as ‘as an intrinsically sus-
tainable and developmental [in humanitarian terms]
technology’.7 Although the potential of GMOs to
advance sustainable agriculture and curb hunger helped
drive their technological development, the humanitarian
rhetoric was inadequately reflected in the research strat-
egies pursued by Monsanto and other seed companies, as
the genetic traits that were initially developed, such as
herbicide and pest tolerance in cash crops, reflected the
needs of large-scale, industrialized, commercial farms
rather than of farmers in the developing world.8
The rhetoric of GMOs as a ‘pro-poor’ technology per-
sists and is particularly prominent in discourses concern-
ing sub-Saharan Africa where a number of factors such
as under- or malnourishment and climate change are
driving the demand for improved agricultural methods
A. Dawson. The Future of Bioethics: Three Dogmas and a Cup of
Hemlock. Bioethics 2010; 24: 218–225.
7
D. Glover. The corporate shaping of GM crops as a technology for
the poor. The Journal of Peasant Studies 2010; 37: 67–90. p.68.
8
Ibid.
606 Ana Komparic
and technologies. The Food and Agriculture Organiza-
tion of the United Nations (FAO) reports that while the
number of undernourished people has declined world-
wide over the past two decades, it has done so primarily
in South-East Asia, East Asia, and in Latin America.
Conversely, Western Asia and Northern Africa have seen
slight increases in the percentage of undernourished
people, while Sub-Saharan Africa has seen the largest
increase.9 Furthermore, sub-Saharan Africa faces unique
agricultural challenges as climate changes occurring over
the next several decades are predicted to result in dra-
matic decreases in agricultural yields (including up to
50% reductions in some areas of Northern and sub-
Saharan Africa).10 Many of these regions already experi-
ence desertification, diminishing soil quality, diminished
nutrient retention capacity, poor or non-existent irriga-
tion, and stagnant yields.11
A number of initiatives are underway to develop trans-
genic crop varieties that address the needs of small-scale
farmers in sub-Saharan Africa, such as drought resistant
variants of local crops12. Yet to date, only four African
countries grow GMOs – Egypt, Burkina Faso, South
Africa, and Sudan – and few others are conducting field
trials.13 The adoption of GMOs in sub-Saharan Africa
has been tepid for several reasons. The success of existing
transgenic crops ventures in Africa remains disputed, as I
will discuss later. Poor biotechnology and intellectual
property regulations in developing countries, and espe-
cially in Africa, are often cited as reasons for the delayed
commercial development of crops specific to the needs of
developing world farmers.14 Moreover, GMO sentiments
in sub-Saharan Africa have long been mixed,15 and anti-
GMO sentiments persist in many areas such as with the
oft-cited example of Zambia’s refusal of a shipment of
donated transgenic maize from the US during a drought
9 God’. These objections often appeal to forms of ethical
Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN (FAO), UN World
Food Programme (WFP) & International Fund for Agricultural Devel-
opment (IFAD). The State of Food Insecurity in the World 2012. Eco-
nomic growth is necessary but not sufficient to accelerate reduction of
hunger and malnutrition. Rome: FAO; 2012; 1–63.
10
J. Beddington et al. Achieving food security in the face of climate
change: Final report from the Commission on Sustainable Agriculture and
Climate Change. Copenhagen, Denmark: CGIAR Research Program
on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS); 2012;
1–60.
11
A. Milton Park. The state of the world’s land and water resources
for food and agriculture : managing systems at risk. New York, NY:
Earthscan; 2011; 285.
12
Takeshima, op. cit. note 3; African Agricultural Technology Foun-
dation (AATF-Africa), op. cit. note 3.
13
C. James. 2011. ISAAA Brief 43–2011: Executive Summary. Ithaca,
NY. Available at: http://www.isaaa.org/resources/publications/briefs/
43/default.asp [cited 2013 March 5].
14
A. Adenle. Response to issues on GM agriculture in Africa: Are
transgenic crops safe? BMC Research Notes 2011; 4: 388.
15
P. Aerni. Stakeholder attitudes towards the risks and benefits of
genetically modified crops in South Africa. Environmental Science and
Policy 2005; 8: 464–76.
in 2002.16 However, understanding how or why such sen-
timents persist is not straightforward. For example,
Robert Paarlberg argues that African anti-GMO senti-
ments have largely arisen due to foreign influence, par-
ticularly due to European trade relations and NGO
networks. While most of the world enjoys agricultural
surpluses that have rendered GMOs unnecessary for
Western consumers (as exemplified by EU restrictions on
GMOs), Paarlberg asserts that Africa’s agricultural
systems cannot forgo the opportunity to embrace GMOs
given present levels of food insecurity.17 Yet Paarlberg’s
analysis has been criticized for overlooking the value of
traditional farming practices and seed varieties, and over-
emphasizing the potential of transgenic crops in address-
ing the agricultural challenges facing African farmers.18
Regardless of where Africa’s anti-GMO sentiments stem
from, the ongoing debate and renewed interest in adopt-
ing transgenic crops warrants a concerted effort by ethi-
cists to understand the value of this technology in the
context of sub-Saharan Africa.
GMOs: THE CURRENT DEBATE
Existing ethical analyses of GMOs centre on three
primary types of issues19 – one focuses largely on factors
intrinsic to GMOs, while the other two concern extrinsic
features. Intrinsic objections to GMOs concern the
nature of genetic engineering itself. Such objections
include assertions that GMOs are inherently unethical
because they are unnatural, illegitimately cross species
boundaries, commodify life (which is unethical not
simply because of negative consequences, but rather
because it is inherently wrong), or that GMOs are
manufactured through processes that involve ‘playing
naturalism, naturalized social contract theories, or to
theologically-grounded moral theories.
The second series of issues concerns the weighing of
risks and benefits to human health or the environment.
Proponents of genetic engineering suggest that transgenic
crops will benefit the environment by reducing tillage as
16
R.L. Paarlberg. Starved for science : how biotechnology is being kept
out of Africa. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press; 2008.
17
Ibid.
18
D.R. Brown. Book Review. Agricultural Systems 2009; 101: 111–112;
W.M. Bowman. Starved for Science: How Biotechnology Is Being Kept
Out of Africa – By Robert Paarlberg. Review of Policy Research 2010;
27: 825–827.
19
For good overviews, see: G. Comstock. Ethics and Genetically Modi-
fied Foods. In F.-T. Gottwald, H.W. Ingensiep & M. Meinhardt,
editors. Food Ethics. New York, NY: Springer: 2010; 49–66;
P. Thompson. Agro-Technology: A Philosophical Introduction. Cam-
bridge: Cambridge University Press; 2011; P.B. Thompson & D.M.
Kaplan, editors. The Encyclopedia of Food and Agricultural Ethics.
Dordrecht, Netherlands: Springer; 2014.
© 2015 John Wiley & Sons Ltd
 The Ethics of Introducing GMOs into sub-Saharan Africa
well as pesticide and herbicide use. Transgenic crops may
also help address food security concerns and enhance the
nutritional value of crops, thus alleviating hunger or mal-
nutrition. On the other hand, those who caution against
the use of GMOs often appeal to the potential risks to
human health and the environment. Examples of such
risks include pest resistance leading to increased pesticide
use, gene transmission, and reducing the genetic pool
through monocultures. The ethical theories that are
used to defend these positions most often include
consequentialist theories (which underlie risk-cost-benefit
analysis), deontological accounts (e.g. in appealing to the
precautionary principle and the wrongness of harm), or
rights-based arguments.
The third set of issues concerns the social and economic
risks and benefits associated with GMOs. Opponents of
the technology voice concerns over seed monopolies,
reduced consumer sovereignty, the misappropriation of
indigenous knowledge, neocolonialism, and the perpetu-
ation of social and economic inequities within and
between communities. Conversely, proponents of the
technology often refer to transgenic crops as ‘pro-poor’
and cite economic and social benefits that would arise
from increased agricultural yields. Both positions
are often justified with reference to consequentialist,
deontological, rights-based or social contract theories.
Given that the latter two sets of issues concern the conse-
quences of GMO use, which are inherently contextualized,
these issues are particularly relevant to the question of
whether GMOs are appropriate for a given community.
Furthermore, if the negative extrinsic consequences attrib-
uted to GMOs could be addressed or adequately out-
weighed by benefits, it is possible that adopting GMOs
may be morally obligatory, or at least permissible.
On the whole, the majority of these discourses draw on
Western moral philosophy. Even when discussing the
developing world, Western philosophy is used as the ana-
lytic framework, while the regional context is dealt with
solely on a material level (e.g. in citing statistics about
food security, agricultural facts, or facts about social
structure).20 This article asserts that, when conducting
ethical analyses in a global context, it is insufficient for
bioethicists to engage with the affected communities on a
material level. Indeed, bioethicists must go deeper than
simply surveying values and analyzing them through the
lens of Western bioethics since the dominant discourses in
contemporary bioethics are also culturally situated in the
20
For example, see: Nuffield Council on Bioethics. The Use of GM
Crops in Developing Countries: A Follow-Up Discussion Paper. London:
Nuffield Council; 2003. Available at: http://nuffieldbioethics.org/wp-
content/uploads/GM-Crops-Discussion-Paper-2003.pdf [cited 2012
November 22]; A.S. Daar et al. In: F. Thiele & R.E. Ashcroft, editors.
Beyond GM Foods: Genomics, Biotechnology and Global Health Equity.
Heidelberg, DEU: Springer: 2005. 33–44; Thompson & Kaplan, editors.
op. cit., note 19.
© 2015 John Wiley & Sons Ltd
607
social realities of the United States and other Western
countries.21 If GMOs are to have a justifiable place in
sub-Saharan Africa’s agricultural future, it is essential
that stakeholders participate and that stakeholder value
systems be considered.22
AFRICAN ETHICS AND UBUNTU
The term African philosophy refers to philosophical
inquiry conducted by African scholars in the postcolonial
era and has been described as driven by ‘a quest for
self-definition’.23 An increasing number of academics are
working in the area of African ethics24 – a prominent
subfield of African philosophy which consists of a body
of thought that describes and analyzes the variety of
ethical values, principles, and systems that have been
developed in African societies for the purposes of guiding
moral behavior. African ethics includes both descriptive
analyses of ethical values held in various African commu-
nities, as well as formal theories that are articulated by
philosophers who draw upon African values.
On the whole, African ethics is largely a humanistic
ethics – one that emphasizes human welfare and wellbe-
ing as a fundamental good25 – a feature shared with many
Western ethical theories. However, an African humanis-
tic ethic manifests itself differently from many Western
theories. As the Ghanaian philosopher Gyekye writes, ‘A
humanistic morality, whose central focus is the concern
for the welfare and interest of each member of a commu-
nity, would expectably be a social morality which is
enjoined by social life itself’.26 According to Gyekye, this
is because ‘it is only through cooperation with other
human beings that the needs and goals of the individual
can be fulfilled.’27 Common good forms the basis of many
African ethics, including that of Ubuntu. This contrasts
with many Western philosophical traditions which regard
human welfare as a fundamental good but translate this
good into an individualistic or utilitarian ethic. Concern-
ing common good, Gyekye writes:
21
Fox & Swazey, op. cit., note 5.
22
While I advocate for the consideration of the ethical values present in
sub-Saharan Africa, the particular values that I cite are only examples
and do not necessarily represent the predominant views of the region, of
which there are many.
23
K. Wiredu, editor. A Companion to African Philosophy. Malden,
MA: Blackwell; 2004.
24
For examples, see the following anthologies: Ibid; M.F. Murove,
editor. African ethics : an anthology of comparative and applied ethics.
Scottsville, South Africa: University of Kwazulu-Natal Press; 2009; G.
Walmsley, editor. African philosophy and the future of Africa. Washing-
ton, DC: Council for Research in Values and Philosophy; 2011.
25
K. KGyekye. African Ethics. 2011. Available at: http://
plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2011/entries/african-ethics/ [cited 2012
Dec 10].
26
Ibid.
27
Ibid.
608 Ana Komparic
The common good [. . .] does not consist of, or derive
from, the goods and preferences of particular individu-
als. It is that which is essentially good for human
beings as such, embracing the needs that are basic to
the enjoyment and fulfillment of the life of each indi-
vidual. If the common good were the aggregate of indi-
vidual goods, it would only be contingently, not
essentially, common and, on that score, it would not be
achieved in a way that will benefit all the individuals in
a society. If the common good is achieved, then the
individual good is also achieved. [. . .] If the common
good were understood as the basic good – as human
good – as such, there would be no need to think of it as
a threat to individual liberty as touted by Western
liberal (individualist) thinkers, for, after all, individual
liberty is held as one of the basic goods of the members
of the society.28
Gyekye also notes that the emphasis on pursuing
common good has an additional implication; namely,
values associated with communitarian morality such as
compassion, solidarity, reciprocity, interdependence, and
cooperation ‘elevate the notion of duties to a status
similar to that given to the notion of rights in Western
ethics’.29 Thus, the moral imperative to fulfill duties to
others, upon this account of African ethics, arises from
the needs and welfare of others, rather than from their
rights.
Ubuntu is one manifestation of a sub-Saharan African
communitarian ethic and is one of the most widely
studied and held African moral systems. Ubuntu rose to
prominence in the philosophical literature in Post-
Apartheid South Africa, but it originated in the pre-
colonial era.30 Ubuntu is often cited alongside common
African dictums such as ‘A person is a person through
other persons’ or ‘I am because we are’.31 Metz and Gaie,
two philosophers who have articulated one theoretical
interpretation of Ubuntu, explain that such dictums shape
African conceptions of personhood, identity, and
humanness by revealing that one’s ‘ultimate goal should
be to become a full person [. . .] or a genuine human being’
where ‘the only way to develop one’s humanness is to
relate to others in a positive way’.32 Accordingly, Ubuntu
may be regarded as an ethics of self-realization similar to
28
Ibid.
29
Ibid. Similar values are often discussed in the context of public health
ethics where the common good is of importance. However, in public
health ethics, the common good is often regarded as being in tension
with individual liberties.
30
M.P. Moore. South Africa Under and After Apartheid. In: K.
Wiredu et al., editors. A Companion to African Philosophy. Malden,
MA: Blackwell; 2004; 149–160. p. 156.
31
T. Metz & J.B.R. Gaie. The African ethic of Ubuntu/Botho: impli-
cations for research on morality. Journal of Moral Education 2010; 39:
273–90. p. 274.
32
Ibid: 275.
that of Aristotelianism as well as a relational ethic similar
to the relational ethics in the feminist ethics literature.
While there are several philosophical articulations of
Ubuntu, they share important similarities. For the pur-
poses of this article, I employ Metz and Gaie’s account of
Ubuntu, which includes two primary features. First,
Ubuntu involves ‘a moral obligation to be concerned for
the good of others, in terms of both one’s sympathetic
emotional reactions toward other people and one’s
helpful behavior toward them’.33.This may also include
an accommodation towards strangers in one’s commu-
nity. In other words, Ubuntu involves a sort of respon-
siveness towards others in general. The second element
involves, ‘a moral obligation to think of oneself as bound
up with others, that is, to define oneself as a member of a
common group and to participate in its practices. One
has a duty to identify with others’.34 Thus, Ubuntu
involves both identity and solidarity on Metz and Gaie’s
account. Unlike communitarian or moral relativist
accounts in Western ethics, which tend to liken identify-
ing with one’s community as adhering to the norms of the
majority or particular social group, Ubuntu suggests that
identifying and seeking out one’s community involves
recognising that community ‘is an objectively desirable
kind of interaction that should instead guide what
majorities want or which norms become dominant’.35
Thus, Ubuntu identifies the common good as the most
fundamental good through which other goods, including
individual wellbeing, are achieved.
IMPLICATIONS OF UBUNTU FOR GMOs
IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA
Goods and values deemed important through moral
reflection can be used to evaluate a technology either in
terms of its intrinsic features or the extent to which it
helps or undermines one’s ability to achieve a goal.
Accordingly, the introduction of GMOs can be evaluated
in reference to its implications for the common good –
understood to be the fundamental good – as defined
by Ubuntu. Of note, much of what has been written con-
cerning the introduction of GMOs into sub-Saharan
Africa or other developing world contexts has focused
on individual rights (e.g. consumer rights or the self-
determination of farmers) or on whether GMOs will curb
or exacerbate poverty and hunger. While Ubuntu neces-
sitates reflecting upon a variety of other considerations
relevant to the introduction of GMOs into sub-Saharan
Africa, I discuss its implications for how health and
33
Ibid: 276.
34
Ibid:
35
Ibid: 275–276.
© 2015 John Wiley & Sons Ltd
 The Ethics of Introducing GMOs into sub-Saharan Africa
environmental risks are conceptualized and how it alters
the scarcity discourses that permeate the GMO debate.
The Nature of Risk
Ubuntu requires legitimate policy-making to reflect com-
munity welfare and promote the common good, and in so
doing, to engage with the broader social context of the
affected communities. To achieve a contextualized policy,
decision-making about GMOs must necessarily involve
both scientists, who are able to give accounts of the bio-
logical mechanisms underlying the technology and the
associated biological benefits and risks, as well as non-
scientists and non-experts, who may speak of benefits and
risks associated with implementing a technology in a spe-
cific manner and context. Thus, Ubuntu requires that the
concept of risk used to inform decision-making be
reconceptualized in two ways. First, it is necessary to
distinguish between biological risks and social risks.
Second, it is necessary to reconsider the scope of risk,
namely whether and how it affects entire communities, as
opposed to individuals.
Cost-benefit analyses, which are commonly used in
health technology assessments to determine whether to
adopt a technology, primarily consider biological risks to
health or the environment. When social risks are taken
into account, they are usually considered in narrow eco-
nomic terms (e.g. how trade is affected). However, by
prioritizing the common good, solidarity, and reciprocity
– principles that are responsive to social context – Ubuntu
emphasizes understanding the systemic conditions that
promote or hinder both individual and population-wide
health. Thus, Ubuntu requires technology risk assessment
to consider social risks arising from the systemic context
of a technology, such as harms resulting from lack of
infrastructure required to properly adopt a technology, in
order to suitably evaluate whether the common good is
served or not. This is because systemic factors and insti-
tutions can directly shape how and by whom a technol-
ogy is used, and thus alter its risk-benefit profile in the
context of real-world use. Amartya Sen highlights the
importance of accounting for social risk in the context of
food insecurity when he argues that famines not only
arise as a result of inadequate food supply, but also from
inequities built into food distribution systems.36
Similarly, the importance of accounting for the sys-
temic context of a technology’s use when evaluating its
cost-benefit profile is highlighted by the case of transgenic
crop production in South Africa. The Makhathini Flats in
the South African province of KwaZulu-Natal, where
transgenic cotton has been grown since 1997, are often
cited as an example of successful GMO implementation
36
A. Sen. Poverty and famines : an essay on entitlement and deprivation.
Oxford: Clarendon Press; 1981.
© 2015 John Wiley & Sons Ltd
609
(as characterized by high adoption rates, high yields, and
reduced pesticide application). However, the long-term
success of this project is disputed, as the majority of
reports only analyze the period immediately following
adoption, which was characterized by a level of success
that has not been sustained in the long-term, especially for
small-scale farmers.37 Indeed, while the agro-ecological
and institutional contexts in which transgenic crops are
grown have a significant influence on the success of such
operations, these factors are not accounted for in trans-
genic crop trial outcome assessments.38 Thus, even though
initial cost-benefit analyses of transgenic crops may
suggest that adopting a technology is favourable, the sys-
temic context of its use must be factored into a real-world
technological assessment so as to understand the risks
faced by farmers or communities who may lack appropri-
ate access to the technology or other means required to
implement it in a way that actually benefits them. Indeed,
insofar as ignoring the systemic conditions necessary for
the successful implementation of a technology may not
only fail to address existing inequities, but may even exac-
erbate them, addressing underlying inequities is necessary
to ensuring that the potential benefits of a technology are
realized across a whole community.
Moreover, when it comes to evaluating health risks,
Ubuntu requires that harms and benefits be evaluated at
the level of the community, rather than solely at the
individual level. This entails not only evaluating physical
and environmental health at the population level, but
also assessing how a technology affects the very social
structures and dynamics that are integral to a given com-
munity. Conceptualizing risk at the community level
necessitates and is complementary to the aforementioned
shift from focusing primarily on the biological features of
health to also accounting for social risks and the systemic
context of a technology.
As with other contexts, Ubuntu is primarily concerned
with the environment insofar as it relates to a community,
and thus does not prima facie permit us to speak of the
environment’s intrinsic worth. However, as it is tradition-
ally interpreted, Ubuntu necessitates living harmoniously
with both past and future generations, and not solely with
one’s contemporaries.39 Accordingly, Ubuntu suggests
37
M.A. Schnurr. Inventing Makhathini: Creating a prototype for the
dissemination of genetically modified crops into Africa. Geoforum 2012;
43: 784–792.
38
D. Glover. Is Bt Cotton a Pro-Poor Technology? A Review and
Critique of the Empirical Record. Journal of Agrarian Change 2010; 10:
482–509; B. Dowd-Uribe. Engineering yields and inequality? How insti-
tutions and agro-ecology shape Bt cotton outcomes in Burkina Faso.
Geoforum 2013; In Press, Corrected Proof Available online 16 March
2013.
39
M.F. Murove, editor. African ethics : an anthology of comparative and
applied ethics. Scottsville, South Africa: University of Kwazulu-Natal
Press; 2009.
610 Ana Komparic
that an ethic of sustainability is required in order to fulfill
duties to future generations.
Using the matrix of risk described above, which
includes biological, social, individual, and community
risk, it is possible to distinguish between different types of
GMOs and evaluate each on its own merits. For example,
introducing Glyphosate or herbicide tolerant (also
known as Roundup-Ready) transgenic crops, which are
used in conjunction with herbicides, may have undesir-
able consequences for the environment and on commu-
nity structures if they generate dependency on costly
herbicides. Conversely, drought resistant transgenic
maize, if tested adequately, has no significant ethical dif-
ference from the hybrid drought-tolerant maize varieties
already commonly used by African farmers. In fact, if
any concerns remain with the transgenic drought tolerant
maize (e.g. concerns about having to purchase seeds
annually, monoculture, etc.), it is also necessary to
address the respective concerns for hybrids, which also
require annual purchasing and are often grown in mono-
culture,40 in order to be consistent. Accordingly, trans-
genic maize, at least prima facie, seems to be ethically
more permissible than Roundup-Ready varieties. On the
other hand, if the primary concerns surrounding trans-
genic crops are the resulting social risks, such as eco-
nomic dependence on multinational corporations, it is
important to recognize that changes in agricultural and
seed distribution systems may be the necessary point of
intervention if GMOs are to be introduced ethically.
From Poverty and Hunger Discourses to
Community Engagement
To date, much of the discourse concerning GMOs in the
developing world has been tied to poverty and hunger.
The seemingly objective states of poverty and hunger
experienced by individuals in the developing world are
seen as providing the moral imperative to adopt yield-
enhancing crops. Yet, poverty and hunger discourses
may limit the agency of the affected individuals and com-
munities as they are often used in place of community
engagement for informing and justifying action. Moreo-
ver, poverty and hunger narratives have inherent limita-
tions. For example, the linear narrative between
inadequate food supply and hunger has been challenged
by philosopher and economist Amartya Sen who
famously argued that famines do not always arise from a
lack of resources, but rather may arise from nascent
40
Indeed, these concerns arise at the systemic level of agricultural prac-
tices and distribution systems rather than being inherent to the technol-
ogy itself. Nonetheless, the practical question of how to decouple
technological innovation from the systemic inequities that permeate
contemporary agro-technology development and dissemination systems
remains.
inequalities in resource distribution mechanisms in a
region.41 Meanwhile, Arturo Escobar has argued that the
hunger narrative, and the institutions and professions
that have been created to address global hunger, have
been used to legitimize the imposition of a development
scheme that has been conceptualized by (and that ben-
efits) those in power.42
Hunger and poverty narratives have also featured
heavily in the GMO debate, with proponents touting
GMOs as a ‘pro-poor’ technology with the potential to
alleviate global hunger and poverty and opponents coun-
tering that GMOs are dangerous precisely because
poverty renders developing countries vulnerable to
exploitation when new technologies are introduced. In
both cases, poverty and hunger bear decidedly negative
connotations and may be used to legitimize the involve-
ment of external rather than local actors in decision-
making. Conversely, African philosopher Godfrey
Tangwa presents a wholly different understanding of
poverty when discussing African communitarian ethics:
the culture within which I was born and within which I
grew up took great pains both to ensure that no one
should die out of sheer poverty and to emphasize that
material poverty is nothing to be ashamed of. [. . .]
That culture took great pains to ensure that the most
basic necessities of life were freely available to all and
sundry. There were taboos against the commercializa-
tion of things such as the staple foods, water, housing,
fuel wood, etc. These were things one gave or received,
or simply took, but which one never bought or sold.43
Indeed, since Ubuntu stresses the importance of duties
rather than rights, the hunger of some may be seen as the
failure of the entire community to fulfill its duties of
ensuring overall wellbeing. In this sense, Ubuntu requires
an approach of sustainability – where excessive poverty
is curbed – though not necessarily through the means
advanced by the dominant development discourse that
reflects the neoliberal tendencies of individual rights, free-
enterprise, and the supremacy of economic discourses.
Magosa and Kaya, two South African scholars whose
work focuses on issues of development and indigenous
knowledge systems, aim to articulate an alternative to the
existing development paradigm by proposing indigenous
knowledge as the foundation for sustainable develop-
ment in Africa. Importantly, they claim that the indig-
enous need not refer to the traditional, but rather that it
refers to whatever contemporary Africans, in their local
41
Sen, op. cit. note 36.
42
A. Escobar. Encountering Development: The Making and Unmaking
of the Third World. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press; 1995
43
G.B. Tangwa. Some African Reflections on Biomedicaland Environ-
mental Ethics. In: K. Wiredu et al., editors. A Companion to African
Philosophy. Malden, MA: Blackwell; 2004; 387–395. p. 393.
© 2015 John Wiley & Sons Ltd
 The Ethics of Introducing GMOs into sub-Saharan Africa
environments, consider important.44 The aim of building
on the indigenous under this interpretation is to ensure
that development reflects ‘the values, interests, aspira-
tions, and/or institutions which are important in the lives
of the African people’.45 To engage with Africa as it is
now involves recognizing that, for example, numerous
staple agricultural crops – including maize, cassava, and
beans – and three major religions – Christianity, Islam,
and Hinduism – are all foreign imports but form an inte-
gral part of contemporary African society. And, at the
same time, these imports have themselves been trans-
formed by local values, tastes or customs.
Shifting the discourse from poverty and hunger to sus-
tainability, as defined by the indigenous, better reflects
the ethic of Ubuntu, and it behooves us to engage directly
with the context of the affected communities and to con-
sider what their goals are. If a community’s interests lie in
helping small subsistence farmers, it is necessary to con-
sider whether potential GMO varieties and crops can be
integrated with successful local crop management tech-
niques rather than to dogmatically romanticize the pas-
toral and the traditional. Rather than creating a false
dichotomy between the indigenous and agro-technology,
we should ask whether they could ever share a symbiotic
relationship. A similar approach may also prove fruitful
in the case of other communal agricultural practices,
including communal land tenure systems and communal
seed banks.
While many opponents of GMOs openly cite the pow-
erful narrative of the natural and the authentic, it is
important to realize that many concerns, such as
monocultures and the requirement to purchase seeds
annually, are already a reality for many African farms.
While critics are right to worry that commercial GMOs
may exacerbate imbalanced power relations, they often
fail to leave adequate space for dialogue concerning how
introducing or not introducing such a technology may
truly affect the communities in the region. Rather than
presupposing the consequences or appealing to hunger
and poverty narratives as a blanket normative justifica-
tion, we should be making space for the affected farmers
and communities to lead these discussions. Moreover, as
ethicists, it is our responsibility to encourage such
participation, and in doing so, engage with the value
systems – such as Ubuntu – that feature prominently in
these communities.
44
M.A. Magosa & H. Kaya. Building the Indigenous: An Appropriate
Paradigm for Sustainable Development in Africa. In: G. Walmsley,
editor. African philosophy and the future of Africa. Washington, D.C.:
Council for Research in Values and Philosophy; 2011; 153–170.
45
Ibid: 153.
© 2015 John Wiley & Sons Ltd
611
CONCLUSION: UBUNTU AND
GLOBAL BIOETHICS
I have outlined some considerations for future directions
and ethical analyses concerning GMOs in sub-Saharan
Africa. I have argued that, to date, ethicists have largely
been engaged with Africa on a material level in their
work, and instead must shift their focus to understanding
the goals and needs – which are ultimately defined
by value systems – of the affected communities. This
approach, however, raises the question of how the uni-
versalism that permeates normative language and schol-
arship can be reconciled with the particularities of time
and place, which differ from community to community.
In a comprehensive article that provides an analysis
and instructive taxonomy for reasoning through dilem-
mas in international research ethics – and, I would argue,
global health ethics as a whole – Solomon Benatar asserts
that moral relativism is not the only alternative to uni-
versalism in a culturally-sensitive or plural bioethics.46
Instead, he articulates a nuanced taxonomy of perspec-
tives on ethical dilemmas in which he identifies moral
absolutism and moral relativism as opposite quadrants
representing the dogmatic adherence to ethical universal-
ism or local ethos respectively. They are balanced by the
adjacent quadrants of reasoned global universalism and
reasoned contextual universalism, both of which empha-
size the process of moral reasoning when addressing
ethical dilemmas. According to Benatar, reasoned global
universalism ‘utilizes a set of abstract ethical principles
that have been developed and justified through a rea-
soned process,’ while reasoned contextual universalism ‘is
reached by taking morally relevant local factors into con-
sideration in applying reasoned global universalism’.47 In
recognizing the relevance of history, geography, culture,
and economics to the interpretation and application of
ethics, reasoned contextual universalism emphasizes the
process of engaging with local value systems in a manner
that facilitates understanding others and emphasizes
finding middle ground, while still allowing value systems
to be evaluated rather than being uncritically accepted.48
This article aims to adopt such a process by not only
analyzing salient ‘material’ contextual features, but by
also attending to local belief systems that ‘provide ways
of ‘seeing’ the world’49 and are integral to identifying
what the foci of agricultural development in Sub-Saharan
Africa ought to be.
Similarly, Tangwa provides an instructive metaphor
for conceptualising the interplay between morality and
46
Benatar, op. cit. note 5.
47
Ibid: 577.
48
Ibid: 576–578.
49
Ibid: 578.
612
culture.50 He argues that all cultures are morally equal in
the same sense that human beings are equal and that,
accordingly, no culture can be said to be superior to
another. All cultures, however, are imperfect owing to
limitations of humans. Referencing Susan Sherwin, he
suggests that cultures, analogous to differing moral theo-
ries, can be regarded as different lenses through which we
observe reality (but never reach an ultimate truth). Later,
he suggests that morality and cultures are like dancing
masquerades where one must change one’s position to
have an ‘adequate but necessarily partial of view’ of the
masquerade. Tangwa asserts that Western culture, as the
‘proprietor of modern bio and other technologies [. . .]
should develop the habit of also standing up and moving
around a bit, to view the dancing masquerade from dif-
ferent perspectives’ lest it exclude the wisdom of other
cultures or even lead to their complete demise.51
Benatar and Tangwa’s analyses point to both the sig-
nificance and possibility of finding commonalities
between different world views and value systems. It is not
surprising then that Ubuntu’s emphasis on the common
good and principles such as solidarity and reciprocity is
echoed in the public health ethics literature which has
grown to prominence in Western applied ethics over the
past several decades. Recognizing the limits of values
such as autonomy has been a mainstay of public health
ethics, which in analyzing issues at the level of popula-
tions, engages with a wider array of contextual features
(e.g. the social determinants of health) than traditional
medical ethics.
50
G.B. Tangwa. Morality and Culture: Are Ethics Culture-Dependent?
In: F. Thiele & R.E. Ashcroft, editors. Bioethics in a Small World.
Heidelberg, DEU: Springer; 2005; 17–21.
51
Ibid: 20.
Ana Komparic
Echoing Benatar and Tangwa’s analyses, if one of the
goals of bioethicists is to outline practical ethical consid-
erations for the adoption of a technology in a given
context, it is valuable to embrace local moral theories as
at least one of many tools in determining relevant ethical
considerations, and ultimately advocating for a course of
action. As Magosa and Kaya suggest, sustainability is
only achieved when technology ‘is assimilated into the life
of the people’.52 Assimilating a technology into a commu-
nity necessitates the consideration of the community’s
value systems and assessing the technology with respect
to its ability to address the community’s goals. While
engaging with local value systems may involve challeng-
ing dominant modes of analysis in bioethics, questioning
and refining the central tenants of bioethics will render it
a more vital and relevant practice as it operates in the
global arena.
Acknowledgements
I am grateful to the Jackman Humanities Institute at the University of
Toronto for providing me with the opportunity to conduct this
research during my tenure as a Chancellor Jackman Undergraduate
Fellow in the Humanities in 2012–2013. I would especially like to
thank Professor Amira Mittermaier for her guidance and support
throughout. My work has also benefited from the comments and
support from the other fellows and staff at the Jackman Humanities
Institute, as well as from comments received at the IAB 12th World
Congress. I am also grateful to have received the Massey College
Catherall Travel Bursary and the University of Toronto SGS Confer-
ence Grant to attend the IAB 12th World Congress.
Ana Komparic is pursuing an MSc at the Leslie Dan Faculty of Phar-
macy and the Joint Centre for Bioethics at the University of Toronto.
52
Magosa & Kaya, op. cit. note 44, p. 151.
© 2015 John Wiley & Sons Ltd