This book provides an assessment of the economic, social, political and environmental effects of plant biotechnology. The authors begin with an examination of current research, and conclude that while investment in the field is growing, it is being increasingly dominated by a small number of multinational corporations in the pharmaceutical and chemical industries. Japanese experts predict that by 2000, profits from such plants will amount to ten per cent of Japan's GNP. But the growth of these industries will involve social and environmental hazards. The authors examine the effects of plants on local ecologies and the likely implications for poorer countries of the mass synthetic production of commodities like rubber, the traditional collection and manufacture of which was a major source of employment.
Lawrence Busch is University Distinguished Professor of Sociology and Co-Director of the Center for the Study of Standards in Society at Michigan State University. Dr. Busch's current interests include the use of standards in public and private policy making, biotechnology and nanotechnology policy, agricultural science and technology policy, higher education in agriculture, and public participation in the policy process. He has been on the faculty at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Lancaster University (UK), and what is now the Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD)(France). He is (co)author or (co)editor of twelve books as well as more than 150 other publications. He is past president of both the Rural Sociological Society and the Agriculture, Food, and Human Values Society, a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, a Chevalier de l'Ordre du Mérite Agricole and an elected member of the Académie d'Agriculture de France. He recently received a doctor honoris causa from the Universidade Técnica de Lisboa.
For a short video on standards see:
http://www.lancs.ac.uk/ideasfestival/busch.htm
For a podcast on standards visit:
http://fare.uoguelph.ca/FARE-talk/index.html
