Many new technologies including GM viruses, GM mosquitoes, custom designed fish, drought tolerant plants are all entering the regulatory arena – in some cases, they have already been released. Many of these new and emerging technologies offer new hopes to myriads of human and animal diseases as well as to biodiversity conservation. Such biotechnologies will force us to ask the hard questions about how we understand, evaluate and treat biotechnology and the associated risks. When is a risk worth taking? Does human wealth outweigh biodiversity? How do we trade off hazards about which we are certain against risks that we are not? And should "transgenics" really be the only focus of our regulatory attention?
This conference aims to bring together a wide variety of stake holders to discuss these issues. This is a unique opportunity to address bio-innovators from across the world. Scientists, regulators, decision makers and civil society leaders from across the globe are confirmed to attend as part of GenØk’s specialist biosafety training course taking place the week before this conference.
• Public health and new technologies
• Biocontrol and biodiversity
• Animal production
• Plant production
• Process and risk methodologies of risk assessment
• Ethics and society
This conference is brought to you by GenØk – Centre for Biosafety, Third World Network (Malaysia) and the Centre for Integrated Research in Biosafety, University of Canterbury (New Zealand) with funding from NORAD.