Biotech awareness a two-way street

Much of the community concern about biotechnology is caused by researchers not focusing enough on community awareness, according to Associate Professor Renato Schibeci from Murdoch's School of Education.

"Science cannot be separated from social science," said Professor Schibeci.

"We can see from the UK's bitter experience over the BSE crisis and the dramas over genetically modified foods.

"On the flipside, the Human Genome Project spent ten per cent of its budget on community awareness and the world embraced its achievements."

Professor Schibeci started investigating community perceptions of science in 1994, trialling some communication workshops with Dr Ian Barns from the Institute for Sustainability and Technology Policy.

He is convinced that scientists need to do more than focus on a product that has a practical potential: they also need to get the community on side and involved right from the start. Innovation involves the community directly; it is not an 'add on'.

"People need to understand that they probably cannot stop biotechnology from proceeding, but they can shape it to work for them," said Professor Schibeci.

"With scientists providing pathways for the community to learn more and contribute to decision making, they will prepare people for innovation so it has more chance of being taken up and may even produce a better, customer-oriented product.

"Scientists need to be open about the possible risks of their products and explain the extent of procedures in place to minimise such risks. Even more importantly, they need to ask the community what else they can do to reassure them.

"Thoughtful members of the community are worried about big picture issues, such as human health and impact on the environment, as well as technical detail.

"The community needs to know that scientists are people too. Few people would be aware that it was actually scientists who put a moratorium on DNA recombinant research in the 1970s, not the community."

Professor Schibeci recently wrote a briefing paper with Heather Dietrich for Biotechnology Australia about his concern about the lack of community awareness funds in the recently announced Centre of Excellence in Biotechnology.

"The ARC has committed $10m to the Australian Centre for Plant Functional Genomics," said Professor Schibeci.

"Its recent guidelines on the proposed Centres of Excellence in research priority areas includes the statement: The ARC encourages Centres to develop and fund appropriate collaborative projects with the Social Sciences and Humanities, since these disciplines have much to offer in assisting Centres to capture the economic, social and cultural benefits of research in the priority areas.

"In contrast, the recently announced Centre of Excellence in Biotechnology, established using some $46.5m provided by the Biotechnology Australia over five years, has no social program because, according Biotechnology Australia, it already has a public awareness program. "This program is essentially a poll tracking exercise; there is no serious sustained research into the impact of biotechnology in the community."

http://www.biotechnology.gov.au/Industry_Research/CoE/Successful_applicant/index.asp