Biotechnology in Developing Countries

In recent years, biotechnology has been considered as an essential tool for socio­economic development by an increasing number of developing countries.

Yet, if anything, as the science frontier of the technology is advancing at an ever accelerating pace, commercial entry into modern biotechnology for most developing countries is rapidly moving away.

Globally, biotechnology science has been profoundly influenced by two factors, namely, the drastic reduction of public funds for research and the dominant role of the private sector in biotechnology R&D for health care, agrifood and other industrial applications.

The compound effect of these factors has been that technological advancement has remained stagnant in those areas that have been deemed unattractive in terms of returns on investment.

These are precisely those areas that are of prime importance for developing countries (e.g. orphan crop and infectious disease research) and in which biotechnology can have a profound effect.

Despite this, donor and technical support agencies have been reluctant to redirect part of their investments away from other conventional types of technology assistance towards biotechnology. The reason that is often invoked is the lack of an enabling environment in most developing countries which would translate biotechnology R&D or import products and services into community­level benefits.

However, it is becoming increasingly evident that conventional programs addressing health care and agricultural productivity needs in the developing world are becoming dependent on biotechnology to enhance their delivery prospects and benefit impacts. Clearly, in developing countries, biotechnology R&D is not the be all and end all. It needs to be coupled with actions to strengthen adoptive capacity (i.e., introduction of information and other key technologies) and to introduce policy and institutional reforms, conducive to public and private investment.

The reason for this is that the ability of developing countries to use biotechnology for public good depends primarily on their capacity to absorb and adapt proprietary technology to their specific needs. Policies with regard to intellectual property protection, increasing scope for intervention, and biosafety are essential in generating an enabling environment for the application of biotechnology.

International agencies have an increasing role to play in identifying areas where the interests of the private sector and the aspirations of developing countries are not mutually exclusive and forge public-private partnerships in these areas.

This editorial is reprinted with kind permission of BINAS News (Vol.3, 1&2, 1997), the Biosafety Information Network and Advisory Service newsletter, jointly published by the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) and the International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (ICGEB).