In the last decade, the number of African countries researching and growing genetically modified seeds (GMOs) has increased fourfold. These efforts are backed by an international consortium of donors who broker agreements between biotechnology companies and African state scientists to lease genetic material for use. Given the involvement of African scientists, proponents argue that these projects are homegrown and necessary to feed the African continent. However, in Ghana, where GM cowpea and rice are currently under field trial, both Ghanaian scientists and anti‐GMO activists are unsatisfied with donor‐constructed realities. Instead, these unlikely bedfellows challenge the discourses that circulate through international development circuits by pointing to a history of both colonial exploitation and sovereign dreams. By doing so, Ghanaian scientists and activists articulate alternative visions for a food sovereign, postcolonial future.

In spite of impressive efforts from public and private organizations over the last 25 years, agricultural biotechnology has gained relatively little ground in Africa. Using ethnographic research and case studies from across the continent, we argue that a complex choreography of socio-political, regulatory, and business conditions is required for agricultural biotechnology projects to ‘succeed’ in Africa. While this choreography is rarely achieved, efforts to bring agricultural biotechnology to the continent have resulted in significant reconfigurations of political, legal, and media landscapes in many African countries. These shifts cry out for more scholarly attention, which we attempt to give here.

Genome editing — a plant‐breeding technology that facilitates the manipulation of genetic traits within living organisms — has captured the imagination of scholars and professionals working on agricultural development in Africa. Echoing the arrival of genetically modified (GM) crops decades ago, genome editing is being heralded as a technology with the potential to revolutionize breeding based on enhanced precision, reduced cost and increased speed. This article makes two interventions. First, it identifies the discursive continuity linking genome editing and the earlier technology of genetic modification. Second, it offers a suite of recommendations regarding how lessons learned from GM crops might be integrated into future breeding programmes focused on genome editing. Ultimately, the authors argue that donors, policy makers and scientists should move beyond the genome towards systems‐level thinking by prioritizing the co‐development of technologies with farmers; using plant material that is unencumbered by intellectual property restrictions and therefore accessible to resource‐poor farmers; and acknowledging that seeds are components of complex and dynamic agroecological production systems. If these lessons are not heeded, genome‐editing projects are in danger of repeating mistakes of the past.

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