Published: 17-06-2024
Who do the ‘techno-optimists’ and gene-editing boosters speak for? As Prof David Christian Rose argued at a recent conference it isn’t necessarily farmers or citizens.
What do agroecological farmers think about agritech?
Published: 28-05-2024
A new report from A Bigger Conversation shows that while agroecological farmers, working in a values-based system, have an interest in technology that serves those values, they have little interest in technology that does not. Its findings emphasise the importance of a more critical and context-specific approach to technological innovation, which contrasts with ‘hard sell’ of Agriculture 4.0.
Webinar series
Gene Editing Regulation - Acknowledging Uncertainty
As the UK and EU consider deregulation of gene edited organisms in food and farming, a persistent criticism has been government and policymakers’ failure to acknowledge or take account of uncertainties inherent in deregulation, and the role that uncertainty plays in determining risk, safety, sustainability and appropriateness.
This failure is, in part, a result of decision-makers’ reliance on a very narrow range of specialist scientific advisors – the very opposite of what is needed in a post-normal science era, where the stakes are high and science is less able to bring certainty to complex issues, and where greater uncertainty demands consideration of the wider landscape and of views and inputs from a more diverse pool of expertise.
Join us as we as we explore some of the facets of uncertainty which sit at the intersection of genetic technologies and the agricultural and natural environment relevant to a 'fit for purpose' regulatory discourse.
Note: In spite of YouTube's insistence on providing "context" this is not a webinar about climate change.