**4.5 Nigeria**

### *4.5.1 Country progress*

Modern biotechnology regulation in Nigeria started in the early 1990s. The Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), which Nigeria signed in 1992, identified GMOs or LMOs as a group of organisms produced by modern biotechnology that needed special attention because of their perceived adverse impacts on biodiversity and human health. Based on the Convention's recommendation, Nigeria ratified its biosafety framework in 2002. Consequently, research practice began in modern biotechnology, along with it the biosafety legal regime became apparent. Subsequently, Biosafety Law was put in place in April 2015 giving birth to the National Biosafety Management Agency (NBMA) for the implementation of the Act which also became amended in 2019.
