Plant Biotechnology and Community Development

Abstract

The following thoughts should not be regarded as the authorized opinion of an expert in plant biotechnology: the author of this exercise is neither an expert in plant biotechnology nor a person authorized to express himself on behalf of the scientific community. He can only avail himself of a recent 5-year experience in trying, with others, to promote research and development in plant biotechnology by working on a scale which could hopefully circumvent some of the most penalizing academic and geographical barriers of the community. This contribution is therefore not as focused as the others on scientific demonstrations, but it will also, at the request of the organizers, address questions of a more general nature: questions which arise at the interface between the research domain of plant biotechnology, and some major development partners in biotechnology for the economic world. This is where the community dimension enters the scene, a concept which, for the purpose of this meeting, will be understood in its broad sense of “societal dimension”; which will be illustrated, however, against the background of European experience, and in the framework of the EEC in particular.

The present article expresses only personal views.