Address Ethical Concerns in Agri-Biotech, Says Paper

Aside from risk assessments, ethical and social concerns must also be addressed with respect to agricultural biotechnologies. Immaculada de Melo-Martin and Zahra Meghani point this out in “Beyond risk: A more realistic risk-benefit analysis of agricultural biotechnologies” published in the EMBO Reports of the European Molecular Biology Organization.

Limiting the ethical discussion about agricultural biotechnologies to questions of risk assessments is problematic. One, it incorrectly assumes that the discussion on potential risks and benefits of agri-biotechnologies is the sole significant normative concern. Second, framing the debate in terms of technical problems effectively limits who legitimately participate in the discussion. “These normative issues must not be left to scientific experts in a democratic society, but should be subjected to proper public deliberations – not ones steered by the media or pressure groups”, said Martin and Meghani.

The paper is available at http://www.nature.com/embor/journal/v9/n4/full/embor200839.html.